BV  4010  .J68 

Joseph,  Oscar  Loos,  1873- 
The  dynamic  ministry 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


https://archive.org/details/dynamicministrysOOjose 


Vi  I  . ; ) j 


n  \- 


V 


The 


JAN 


1924 


5SICAL  StV# 


Dynamic  Ministry 


A  Study  of  the  Fourfold  Duty  of 
the  Minister 


BY  y 

OSCAR  L.  JOSEPH 


“Take  heed  to  the  ministry  which  thou  hast  received 
in  the  Lord,  that  thou  fulfill  it.” — Colossians  J^.  17. 


THE  ABINGDON  PRESS 

NEW  YORK  CINCINNATI 


Copyright,  1923,  by 

OSCAR  L.  JOSEPH 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


The  Bible  text  used  in  this  volume  is  taken  from  the  American 
Standard  Edition  of  the  Revised  Bible,  copyright,  1901,  by  Thomas 
Nelson  &  Sons,  and  is  used  by  permission. 


To 

THE  REVEREND 

BISHOP  LUTHER  B.  WILSON.  D.D.,  LL.D. 

WISE  ADMINISTRATOB  AND  DISCERNING 
PREACHER,  IN  APPRECIATION  AND 
AFFECTION 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTEK  PAGE 

Preface .  7 

I.  Thoughts  for  Transition  Times .  9 

II.  The  Advancing  Protestantism .  37 

III.  The  Distinctive  Pulpit .  71 

IV.  The  Generous  Pastorate .  105 

V.  The  Opulent  Worship .  135 


/ 


Oft  when  the  Word  is  on  me  to  deliver 
Lifts  the  illusion  and  the  truth  lies  bare; 
Desert  or  throng,  the  city  or  the  river. 

Melts  in  a  lucid  Paradise  of  air — 

Only  like  souls  I  see  the  folk  thereunder. 
Bound  who  should  conquer,  slaves  who 
should  be  kings. 

Hearing  their  one  hope  with  an  empty 
wonder. 

Sadly  contented  in  a  show  of  things; 

Then  with  a  rush  the  intolerable  craving 
Shivers  throughout  me  like  a  trumpet-call — 
Oh,  to  save  these!  to  perish  for  their  saving, 
Die  for  their  life,  be  offered  for  them  all! 

— Frederick  W.  H.  Myers:  Saint  Paul,  p.  34.^ 

1  Reprinted  with  permission  of  Macmillan  &  Co.,  Ltd., 
Publishers,  London. 


PREFACE 


This  book  has  frankly  nothing  to  say  about 
programs  but  something  about  ideals.  It  is 
here  concerned  with  underlying  principles  and 
motives.  The  author  has  tried  to  place  the 
exacting  work  of  the  Christian  ministry  in  a 
spacious  background,  convinced  that  if  this 
is  recognized  and  accepted  there  shall  be 
rediscovered  the  opulence  of  our  resources  and 
such  ways  promptly  devised  as  shall  help  to 
further  the  kingdom  of  our  God  and  his  Christ, 
through  the  church,  which  is  absolutely  the 
indispensable  agency  for  human  welfare. 

O.  L.  J. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION 

TBIES 


“When  that  which  is  perfect  is  come,  that  which 
is  in  part  shall  be  done  away.” — 1  Corinthians  13. 10. 

“A  living  church  must  be  a  developing  church, 
and  if  it  is  to  develop  it  must  have  spiritual  free¬ 
dom  and  autonomy.  There  need  be  no  hostility 
to  doctrinal  religion,  for  a  religion  without  doc¬ 
trines  would  be  a  vague  and  nebulous  abstraction, 
something  which  could  neither  be  taught  nor  spread. 
It  is  clear,  however,  that  a  church  is  not  to  be 
helplessly  and  hopelessly  bound  by  what  men 
thought  in  the  past.  Liberty  seems  to  be  essential 
if  the  churches  are  to  express  their  convictions  in 
their  own  way  and  to  keep  in  touch  with  the  grow¬ 
ing  thought  of  the  w^orld.  This  is  not  inconsistent 
with  religious  continuity.  No  student  of  theology 
but  knows  how  the  early  church  appropriated  ideas 
from  its  environment  in  order  to  express  its  spir¬ 
itual  faith  in  terms  of  doctrine  and  still  maintained 
the  continuity  of  its  spiritual  life.  And  what  was 
possible  then  is  now  possible.  The  continuity  of 
the  Christian  religion  does  not  lie  in  certain  fixed 
and  unalterable  statements,  but  in  the  abiding 
presence  of  Christ’s  spirit  in  human  hearts  and 
lives.” — George  Galloway:  ^^Religion  and  Modern 
Thought,'^  p.  41.^ 

1  Reprinted  with  permission  of  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons,  Pub¬ 
lishers,  New  York  City. 


CHAPTER  I 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES 

The  man  who  built  his  house  on  the  sands 
was  lacking  in  forethought.  He  made  no 
provision  for  the  day  of  emergency  and 
assumed  that  he  would  pass  his  life  only  under 
fair  skies.  When  the  storm  burst  he  found 
himself  in  ruins.  It  availed  him  nothing  to 
throw  the  blame  on  unfavorable  conditions, 
when,  in  reality,  he  was  guilty  of  reckoning 
without  all  the  facts.  He  had  an  evasive  dis¬ 
position  and  deluded  himself  with  the  idea  that 
he  could  get  through  somehow  and  escape 
any  mishaps  which  perchance  might  overtake 
him.  He  may  have  talked  with  seeming  wis¬ 
dom  about  not  crossing  the  bridge  until  he 
gets  there,  and  he  was  doubtless  commended 
for  his  common  sense.  But  his  confidence 
was  a  mere  assumption  and  his  optimism  was 
a  species  of  make-believe.  Since  he  was  not 
aware  of  any  difficulties  he  concluded  that 
they  did  not  exist.  He  was  shortsighted  be¬ 
cause  he  was  self-centered  and  he  argued  in  a 
circle  which  was  too  severely  circumscribed. 

11 


n  THE  DYNAIMIC  MINISTRY 

Indeed,  his  was  a  case  of  center  without  cir¬ 
cumference.  He  illustrates  the  folly  of  an 
individualism  which  begins  and  ends  with  one’s 
self,  and  which  seeks  for  exceptions  in  one’s 
own  favor,  so  as  to  evade  the  law  of  cause 
and  effect  that  applies  to  everyone.  To  be 
sure,  the  exception  proves  the  rule;  but  there 
are  some  rules  that  permit  of  no  exceptions, 
particularly  in  the  realm  of  moral  rectitude, 
intellectual  integrity,  and  spiritual  veracity. 
Under  no  circumstances  could  light  be  con¬ 
fused  with  darkness.  The  region  of  twilight 
is  so  tantalizing  because  it  is  neither  one  nor 
the  other.  The  Great  Teacher  was  eternally 
right  when  he  said,  ‘Tf  therefore  the  light 
that  is  in  thee  be  darkness,  how  great  is  the 
darkness.”^  He  was  uttering  a  warning  against 
self-deception  and  self-delusion,  which  induce 
those  who  suffer  therefrom  to  live  in  a  fool’s 
paradise,  a  land  of  mirage,  or  one  where  the 
aurora  borealis  fascinates  but  fails  to  give  light. 

It  is  therefore  a  fortunate  circumstance  when 
the  builder  on  the  sand  finds  out  that  he  was 
misguided.  It  is  not  a  happy  experience  to 
witness  one’s  work  in  a  state  of  collapse,  but 
if  one  learns  from  mistakes  to  do  differently, 
then  he  might  well  be  congratulated,  for  he 


2  Matthew  6.  23. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  13 


would  brace  himself  to  undertake  anew,  under 
different  auspices.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  he 
sits  down  amidst  the  ashes  of  his  desolation 
and  indulges  in  self-pity  and  looks  for  com¬ 
miseration  instead  of  courage,  his  prospects 
are  indeed  gloomy.  Nothing  is  really  lost  if 
one  retains  his  faith  and  has  an  open  mind. 
He  who  recognizes  his  mistakes  and  acknowl¬ 
edges  them  is  in  a  sure  way  toward  recuper¬ 
ating  his  losses.  He  who  has  a  closed  mind 
and  insists  that  he  is  right,  even  when  the 
results  contradict  such  a  conclusion,  is  equally 
certain  to  descend  to  lower  depths  of  failure 
and  to  continue  misadventures  that  produce 
vexation  and  vanity  of  spirit. 

In  these  recent  years  we  have  been  making 
some  humiliating  discoveries.  The  Great  War 
and  the  aftermath  turned  on  the  searchlight, 
to  show  us  that  many  things  we  thought  could 
not  exist  did  actually  exist.  Where  we  sup¬ 
posed  great  advances  had  been  made  we  found 
that  things  existed  in  a  state  of  hapless  help¬ 
lessness: 

1.  We  boasted  of  our  educational  institu¬ 
tions  and  flattered  ourselves  that  we  were  an 
enlightened  nation  in  comparison  with  some 
of  the  European  peoples.  The  army  tests  of 
intelligence  for  drafted  men,  even  if  considered 
as  only  partially  reliable,  revealed  the  startling 


14 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


fact  that  more  than  one  half  of  our  adult 
population  is  made  up  of  people  less  than  fif¬ 
teen  years  of  age  mentally,  and  that  the  greater 
part  of  these  fail  to  pass  the  twelfth  year  of 
age  standard  of  intelligence.  Of  this  number 
many  are  native  Americans,  and  not  all  of 
them  are  among  the  mountain  whites  or  of 
the  Negro  race.  This  fact  helps  us  to  under¬ 
stand  why  quackery  of  all  sorts — religious, 
medical,  political,  and  social — has  such  a  fertile 
field  in  our  midst. 

2.  The  searching  estimates  of  Viscount  Bryce 
pointed  out  many  of  our  shortcomings  in  his 
American  Commonwealth  and  Modern  Democ- 
racies.  We  received  his  appraisals  without 
any  seriousness  and  with  a  sort  of  neglige 
indulgence,  while  less  authoritative  critics  were 
treated  with  scorn.  Professor  Santayana  wrote: 
“In  temper  America  is  docile  and  not  at  all 
tyrannical;  it  has  not  predetermined  its  career, 
and  its  merciless  momentum  is  a  passive  re¬ 
sultant.  .  .  .  The  American  may  give  an  exor¬ 
bitant  value  to  subsidiary  things,  but  his  error 
comes  of  haste  in  praising  what  he  possesses 
and  trusting  the  first  praise  he  hears.  He 
can  detect  sharp  practices,  because  he  is  capable 
of  them,  but  vanity  or  wickedness  in  the 
ultimate  aims  of  a  man,  including  himself,  he 
cannot  detect,  because  he  is  ingenuous  in  that 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  15 


sphere.  He  thinks  life  splendid  and  blameless, 
without  stopping  to  consider  how  far  folly  and 
malice  may  be  inherent  in  it.  He  feels  that 
he  himself  has  nothing  to  dread,  nothing  to  hide 
or  apologize  for;  and  if  he  is  arrogant  in  his 
ignorance,  there  is  often  a  twinkle  in  his  eye 
when  he  is  most  boastful.”^  This  easy-going 
manner  has  made  us  delightful  company,  but 
it  has  also  exposed  us  to  many  dangers,  from 
some  of  which  we  have  not  escaped.  This 
might  be  illustrated  from  the  political  and 
economic  spheres,  which  show  too  great  a 
readiness  on  our  part  to  forget  and  to  forgive. 

3.  No  one  questioned  the  innumerable  activ¬ 
ities  of  the  church.  We  were  given  to  cam¬ 
paigns  of  all  sorts — evangelism  and  revivalism 
at  periodical  intervals  went  hand  in  hand  with 
conventions  and  conferences  and  movements 
in  the  interest  of  missionary  and  other  work. 
Everything  was  undertaken  on  a  large  scale 
and  we  were  greatly  impressed  by  numbers 
and  quick  results.  All  this  was  gratifying, 
and,  although  some  discerned  weaknesses  in 
institutional  religion,  their  voices  of  protest 
were  drowned  in  the  pseans  of  gratitude  and 
gratulation  that  went  up  from  thousands  of 

®  Character  and  Opinion  in  the  United  States,  p.  212f. 
Reprinted  with  permission  of  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons,  Pub¬ 
lishers,  New  York  City. 


16 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


altars.  Where  there  was  so  much  to  show  of 
accomplishment,  any  questionings  were  re¬ 
garded  as  signs  of  hypercriticism.  The  con¬ 
clusions  of  the  dissenters  were,  however,  justi¬ 
fied  by  the  investigations  made  during  the  war. 
It  was  discovered  and  reported  in  such  books 
as  Religion  Among  American  Men  that  there 
was  a  serious  lack  of  knowledge  of  the  fimda- 
mentals  of  religion.  We  had  assumed  too 
much  and  verified  too  little.  We  explained 
the  lax  attendance  at  church  services  as  due 
to  worldliness  and  interest  in  pleasure.  It 
never  struck  us  that  it  might  probably  be 
due  to  misunderstanding  of  the  real  place  and 
value  of  religion  in  daily  life.  How  could  that 
be  when  om*  Sunday  schools  were  flourishing, 
when  our  young  people’s  societies  were  active, 
when  our  church  buildings  were  multiplying 
and  many  of  them  were  erected  on  a  sumptu¬ 
ous  scale,  when  our  leaders  were  busy  in  end¬ 
less  ways,  and  when  the  rank  and  file  of  our 
membership  seemed  to  be  doing  their  best.^ 
Judged  by  the  test  of  quantity,  no  one  could 
register  a  complaint,  although  the  test  of  qual¬ 
ity  might  not  have  been  quite  so  satisfactory. 
We  are  now  called  upon  to  revise  our  judgments 
by  acknowledging  that  vast  numbers  in  our 
churches,  men  and  women,  are  in  an  “impene¬ 
trable  fog”  concerning  the  distinctive  truths  of 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  17 


Christianity  and  their  bearing  upon  life.  Those 
who  are  deeply  interested  in  this  matter  should 
read  The  Church  in  America^  by  Professor 
William  Adams  Brown.  It  is  an  exhaustive 
examination  and  a  sympathetic  interpretation 
of  the  spirit,  purpose,  and  program  of  American 
Protestantism,  with  suggestions  looking  toward 
more  effective  ways  of  advance  for  the  king¬ 
dom  of  God  through  the  Church  of  Christ. 
The  fact  that  a  situation  similar  to  our  own 
has  been  discovered  in  the  British  churches, 
as  indicated  in  such  volumes  as  The  Army 
and  Religion^  The  Church  in  the  Furnace,  In 
Darkest  Christendom  and  a  Way  Out  of  the  Dark¬ 
ness,  by  Arthur  Bertram,  only  intensifies  the 
urgency  of  our  common  need.  Here,  then, 
is  a  summons  to  give  earnest  thought  to  de¬ 
vising  and  applying  such  remedies  as  shall 
impart  greater  strength  and  stability  to  the 
church,  to  do  her  work  in  harmony  with  the 
divine  purpose  of  world  redemption,  revealed 
in  Jesus  Christ  our  Saviour  and  Lord. 

Criticism,  especially  of  the  negative  sort,  is 
easy  and  popular.  Far  more  difficult  is  the 
constructive  criticism  which  is  not  popular 
because  it  offers  no  ready-made  panaceas  that 
save  us  from  the  exertion  of  thought.  It  is 
this  latter,  however,  that  is  needed  in  this 
day  of  querulous  questioning,  defiant  doubt, 


18 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


fading  faith,  and  bewildering  burdens.  It  is 
significant  of  much  that  the  modern  attitude 
to  religion  shows  a  disposition  to  understand  it 
rather  than  to  explain  it  away.  Since  the 
Christian  religion  is  historical,  it  can  be 
understood  only  in  the  light  of  history.  Dog¬ 
matic  assertions  and  creedal  declarations  are 
not  valid  unless  they  have  a  historical  basis 
in  religious  experience.  It  is,  moreover,  a 
healthy  sign  that  ‘‘our  age  is  critical,  dissatis¬ 
fied,  restless,  and  impatient  of  weakness  and 
platitude.’’^  There  is,  furthermore,  a  desire  to 
seek  a  working  adjustment  between  the  claims 
of  authority  and  reason  by  an  appeal  to  funda¬ 
mental  religious  experience.  There  is  no  such 
thing  as  pure  authority  or  pure  rationality. 

The  oft-quoted  words  of  Pascal,  “the  heart 
has  its  reasons  which  the  intellect  knows  not 
of,”  express  a  form  of  irrationalism  similar  to 
the  lines  of  Tennyson  about  the  freezing 
reason’s  colder  part.  Dean  Inge  rightly  pro¬ 
tests  against  the  dualism  of  thought  that 
science  gives  us  facts  without  values  and 
religion  values  without  facts.  Such  a  view 
inevitably  brings  us  to  the  misleading  con¬ 
clusion  that  “science  tells  us  what  is  true; 
philosophy  and  religion  spread  over  the  cheer- 


*  George  Galloway:  Religion  and  Modern  Thought^  p.  53. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  19 


less  scene  the  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or 
land.”^  This  is  an  evasion  that  is  both  unhis- 
torical  and  untenable.  The  so-called  quarrel 
between  religion  and  science  has  really  been 
a  quarrel  between  theological  dogmas  and 
scientific  hypotheses.  We  have  had  dismal 
evidence  of  this  unfortunate  recrudescence  of 
error  in  recent  months,  instigated  by  men  who 
have  only  a  speaking  acquaintance  with  scholar¬ 
ship,  and  who  have  endeavored  to  stampede 
the  church  by  hysterical  appeals  to  emotional¬ 
ism  on  questions  that  belong  to  the  sphere  of 
learning,  and  which  must  be  settled  by  the 
schools  rather  than  by  the  political  caucus. 

There  are  some  who  suppose  that  a  telling 
phrase  solves  a  problem.  They  aver  that  a 
catchy  word  or  a  striking  sentence  is  sufficiently 
comprehensive  to  express  what  they  believe. 
The  fact  that  Christian  Science  is  neither 
Christian  nor  science,  but  is  a  cult  at  once 
pantheistic  and  superstitious,  has  not  pre¬ 
vented  the  unwary  from  being  convinced  by 
its  pompous  pretensions.  Fundamentalism  is 
a  new  word  used  by  certain  Church  people 
to  represent  what  they  think  are  the  funda¬ 
mental  truths  of  Christianity.  An  examination 

^Outspoken  Essays.  Second  Series,  p.  3.  Reprinted  with 
permission  of  Longmans,  Green  &  Co.,  Publishers,  New 
York  City. 


20 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


of  their  platform,  however,  leads  to  the  con¬ 
clusion  that  a  more  accurate  word  to  de¬ 
scribe  their  standpoint  would  be  Elementarism. 
These  militant  believers  hold  the  elementary 
truths  of  the  Christian  religion,  which  have 
not  been  thought  out  and  thought  through  by 
them  to  their  developed  conclusions.  Their 
theology  is  that  of  the  kindergarten  order  and 
their  ideas  are  more  akin  to  materialistic 
crudities  than  to  spiritual  perfection.  They 
are  guided  by  sophistry  and  sentimentalism 
rather  than  by  the  disciplined  and  balanced 
thinking  of  exact  scholarship.  The  fact  that 
they  are  passionate  and  practical  must  not  lead 
to  the  inference  that  they  are  reliable  and  accept¬ 
able,  for  such  a  test  would  give  a  high  place  to  the 
propagandists  of  all  forms  of  erroneous  thinking 
and  living.  The  very  sincerity  of  these  ‘‘ele- 
mentarists”  makes  it  all  the  more  difficult  to 
convince  them  of  anything  to  the  contrary. 

Over  against  them  should  be  placed  those 
who  accept  what  might  be  called  Essential- 
ism.  These  have  learned  to  discriminate  be¬ 
tween  what  is  primary  and  what  is  secondary. 
They  are  not  radicals  nor  revolutionaries,  nor 
are  they  moved  by  the  claptrap  of  opportun¬ 
ism  and  expediency.  They  realize  that  the 
past  should  be  related  to  the  present,  to  the 
point  of  being  assimilated,  but  that  the  past 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  21 


should  not  arbitrarily  dominate  the  present. 
They  recognize  the  principle  of  development, 
which  does  not  necessarily  contradict  what  has 
gone  before  but,  rather,  completes  it  and 
creates  the  atmosphere  for  yet  further  ad¬ 
vances,  in  accord  with  the  apostolic  precept  to 
“grow  in  the  grace  and  knowledge  of  our  Lord 
and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ.”®  They  have  a 
clear  understanding  of  the  relative  worth  of 
values  and  estimate  them  in  the  light  of  ideal¬ 
ism  and  pragmatism.  They  know  that  an 
ideal  is  what  ought  to  be  but  is  not,  but  that 
it  will  be  though  it  is  not  yet.^  They  therefore 
press  on  toward  the  goal,  unto  the  prize  of 
the  high  calling  of  God  in  Christ  Jesus,  encour¬ 
aged  to  do  so  by  present  attainments,  which 
are  an  earnest  of  future  accomplishments. 
They  welcome  light  from  every  source  and 
plead  for  liberty  of  thought,  to  enable  the 
Church  to  express  her  convictions  in  keeping 
with  the  philosophical,  scientific  and  social 
environment  of  the  age.  Above  all,  they  are 
assured  of  the  supreme  sufficiency  of  the  In¬ 
carnate  Son  of  God,  who,  by  reason  of  his 
divine-human  fullness,  is  competent  to  meet 
all  the  demands  of  our  own  day. 

There  need  be  no  quarrel  between  those  who 

®  2  Peter  3.  18. 

’  Compare  In^e:  Outspoken  Essays.  Second  Series,  p.  21. 


22 


THE  DYNAmC  MINISTEY 


hold  to  what  is  elementary  and  those  who 
advocate  what  is  essential.  The  latter,  in 
their  desire  for  clarity  of  thought,  urge  the 
need  for  simplification  that  calls  for  the  omis¬ 
sion  of  certain  teachings  which,  however,  are 
not  fundamental  to  the  faith  but  rather 
accessories  or  incidentals.  They  view  the  uni¬ 
verse  as  dynamic  rather  than  static,  and  their 
conception  of  God  provides  for  the  divine 
transcendence  as  well  as  the  divine  immanence. 
The  creative  and  redemptive  power  of  God 
is  still  at  work,  as  we  declare  when  we  confess 
our  belief  in  the  Holy  Spirit,  who  is  still  taking 
of  the  things  of  God  and  showing  them  unto  men. 

When  we  read  the  New  Testament  we  are 
impressed  by  the  fact  that  the  early  church 
enjoyed  diversity  in  unity  and  nowhere  com¬ 
pelled  her  members  to  submit  to  the  dead 
hand  of  uniformity.  This  sorry  anticlimax 
came  in  the  later  centuries,  with  the  rise  of 
the  Catholic  Church,  when  ecclesiasticism  sup¬ 
planted  the  freedom  of  the  Spirit.  There  were 
many  strands  of  thought  and  experience  in 
the  apostolic  church,  but  the  differences  were 
made  subservient  to  the  fundamental  accept¬ 
ance  of  the  sublimely  central  leadership  of 
Jesus  Christ.^  Where  this  was  acknowledged. 


®  Compare  C.  A.  Anderson  Scott:  Dominus  Nosier,  p.  164flF. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  23 


divers  accents  and  emphases  were  not  only 
tolerated  but  welcomed.  The  New-Testament 
writings  are  not  dogmatic  declarations  but 
dynamic  expositions  of  the  central  verities. 
They  took  cognizance  of  varieties  of  opinion 
and  of  temperament,  and  reckoned  with  the 
principle  of  development  in  the  conceptions 
and  claims  of  the  evangel,  as  they  endeavored 
to  meet  the  needs  of  Judaism,  of  paganism,  and 
of  the  growing  Christian  consciousness.  The 
New  Testament  is  thus  an  apologetic  not  in 
defense  of  Christianity  but  as  an  interpretation 
of  it.  It  was  addressed  primarily  to  Christian 
communities,  to  clarify  their  thought,  to  re¬ 
move  misconceptions  and  misunderstandings,  to 
suggest  the  relation  between  essentials  and 
incidentals  in  doctrine,  to  establish  and  apply 
the  permanent  principles  according  to  which 
Jew  and  Gentile,  bond  and  free,  proletariat, 
bourgeoisie  and  aristocrat,  educated  and  un¬ 
learned,  might  find  a  common  ground  for  the 
practice  of  the  Christian  virtues  in  the  unity 
of  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  which  is  the  bond  of 
perfectness. 

We  are  accustomed  to  think  of  Paul  and 
John  as  exercising  a  monopoly  of  influence 
in  the  early  church.  As  a  matter  of  historical 
fact,  there  were  Christian  communities  inde¬ 
pendent  of  these  two  leaders,  among  whom 


24 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


free  speculation  was  practiced,  more  especially 
after  the  early  days  of  enthusiasm  had  passed. 
The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  is  the  one  book 
of  the  New  Testament  which  illustrates  this 
exercise  of  Gnosis,  or  Knowledge,  at  different 
Christian  centers  during  the  first  century.  The 
Parousia  hopes  had  not  been  realized  and  apoc¬ 
alyptic  beliefs,  whatever  their  benefits,  did 
not  appeal  to  this  class  of  Christians  any  more 
than  they  appeal  to  many  thoughtful  Chris¬ 
tians  today.  There  was,  moreover,  a  decay  of 
faith  and  earnestness  under  the  pressure  of 
trials.  The  older  categories  and  formulations, 
however  effectual  in  the  preceding  generation, 
found  no  quickening  response  from  them. 
They  had  lost  their  grip  and  were  in  danger 
of  being  completely  bowled  over.  This  letter 
of  enlightenment,  exhortation,  and  encourage¬ 
ment  expressed  the  conviction  that  Christian¬ 
ity,  however  noble  its  past,  has  not  yet  run 
its  course  and  that  it  has  a  peculiarly  timely 
message  for  the  perplexed  mind  and  the  dis¬ 
tressed  spirit.  To  be  sure,  this  epistle  does 
not  have  the  freshness  and  ardor  of  Paul,  nor 
does  it  have  the  spiritual  mysticism  of  the 
author  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  It  is  a  link  be¬ 
tween  them  and  it  was  written  at  a  time  of 
transition,  when  a  feeling  of  spiritual  exhaus¬ 
tion  had  overtaken  the  church. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  25 


This  thinker  was  aware  that  the  earlier 
sanctions  no  longer  held,  that  is,  so  far  as 
their  method  and  manner  of  appeal  were  con¬ 
cerned.  He,  therefore,  had  consecrated  courage 
and  the  originality  of  independent  thinking, 
to  adjust  the  eternal  message  of  Christ  to  the 
changed  and  changing  circumstances  of  his 
day,  without  modifying  the  accepted  funda¬ 
mentals  of  the  church.  One  who  follows  such 
a  course  is  always  exposed  to  the  charge  of 
inconsistency;  but  the  writer  of  this  epistle 
found  it  both  compatible  and  congenial,  and 
withal  practicable  and  mandatory,  to  have 
aflSnities  with  primitive  Christianity  and  Alex¬ 
andrian  thought.  He  was  very  much  in  the 
position  of  the  modem  preacher  who  accepts 
the  conclusions  of  science  and  philosophy, 
without  feeling  that  they  militate  in  the  least 
against  the  essential  truth  as  it  is  in  Jesus. 
This  unknown  writer  of  the  first  century  took 
his  stand  on  current  Christian  beliefs  but 
developed  larger  conclusions  from  them.  “He 
was  anxious  to  discover  new  possibilities,  new 
reaches  of  truth,  in  the  message  that  had  come 
down  to  him,  but  only  on  the  condition  that 
the  message  itself  was  to  stand  unchallenged.”® 

®E.  F.  Scott:  The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  p.  76.  Reprinted 
with  permission  of  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons,  Publishers,  New 
York  City. 


26 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


His  constant  appeal  is  to  go  on  to  perfection 
in  Christ,  for  it  is  better  farther  on. 

The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  is  of  special 
interest  to  preachers.  It  was  written  at  a 
time  when  the  foundations  were  shaking, 
when  nothing  was  taken  for  granted,  when 
everything  was  questioned.  How  like  our  own 
day!  There  have  been  similar  periods  in  the 
history  of  the  church,  and  it  was  due  to  Chris¬ 
tian  thinkers  that  the  church  was  rescued  from 
lapsing  into  a  state  of  sheer  inertia.  In  the 
fifth  century,  after  the  sack  of  Rome  by  Alaric, 
it  was  Augustine  who  set  forth  in  his  Civitas 
Dei  a  Christian  philosophy  of  history.  In  the 
fourteenth  century,  when  both  church  and 
state  were  in  a  condition  of  decadence,  Dante 
expounded  in  De  Monarckia  his  conception  of 
an  international  empire  based  on  brotherhood 
and  love.  Bishop  Butler  wi*ote  The  Analogy 
of  Religion  to  meet  the  cynical  skepticism  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  Although  he  stood 
outside  the  evangelical  movement  and  was 
even  hostile  to  it,  he  had  no  small  share  in 
furthering  it,  by  compelling  the  thoughtful  to 
reckon  with  Christianity  as  both  rational  and 
spiritual.  These  three  typical  utterances  illus¬ 
trate  how  transition  times  were  understood  by 
Christian  thinkers.  They  distinguished  be¬ 
tween  the  permanent  elements  of  Christianity 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  27 


and  their  varying  doctrinal  expressions.  The 
latter  were  necessarily  subject  to  change  under 
the  influence  of  philosophy,  science,  and  liter¬ 
ature.  ‘‘A  great  financier,  the  elder  J.  P. 
Morgan,  once  said  of  an  existing  financial 
condition  that  it  was  suffering  from  ‘undigested 
securities,’  and,  paraphrasing  him,  is  it  not 
possible  that  man  is  suffering  from  undigested 
achievements  and  that  his  salvation  must  lie 
in  adaptation  to  a  new  environment,  which, 
measured  by  any  standard  known  to  science, 
is  a  thousandfold  greater  in  this  year  of  grace 
than  it  was  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth 
century 

One  purpose  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews 
was  to  suggest  how  the  “undigested  securities” 
of  Christianity  might  be  utilized  to  greater 
advantage  in  a  world  of  change.  Its  lofty 
idealisnji  and  its  intensely  practical  interest 
recalled  many  a  straggler  to  the  things  that 
could  not  be  shaken.  Professor  Rendel  Harris 
pointed  out  that  it  was  the  supreme  merit 
of  its  unknown  author,  during  the  greatest 
crisis  which  the  world  has  ever  faced,  to  look 
through  the  flames  in  which  church  and  state 
were  being  consumed  together,  and  to  assert 

“James  M.  Beck:  The  Constitution  of  the  United  States, 
p.  193.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  George  H.  Doran 
Company,  Publishers,  New  York  City. 


28 


THE  DYNAMIC  jVHNISTRY 


that  the  rocks  were  not  burning.  The  gar¬ 
ments  would  doubtless  perish,  but  the  inner 
reality  they  clothed  would  remain  and  be  all 
the  more  precious  for  the  purifying  fire.  There 
was,  then,  no  occasion  for  alarm,  but  rather 
a  summons  to  action,  based  on  clear  and  keen 
thinking,  that  would  give  a  more  steadfast 
faith  in  God,  in  Christ,  and  in  the  continuous 
ministrations  of  the  church.  The  autor  ad 
Hehraeos  is  at  times  difficult  to  follow  because 
his  method  of  exegesis  was  tinged  by  allegor¬ 
ical  interpretations.  This  is  only  to  acknowl¬ 
edge  that  he  used  the  thought  terms  of  his  own 
day,  as  was  inevitable  not  only  in  his  own 
case  but  in  that  of  all  the  New-Testament 
writers,  as  well  as  of  Augustine,  Dante,  Butler, 
and  all  thinkers,  who,  in  their  several  days, 
made  their  respective  contributions.  This 
right  and  privilege — to  think  and  to  write  in 
accord  with  the  manner  of  our  day — should 
certainly  not  be  denied  us,  nor,  mdeed,  should 
we  be  expected  to  accept  the  theology  of  a  pre- 
scientific  age,  even  though  indorsed  by  learned 
and  venerable  names. 

The  early  church  boldly  appropriated  ideas 
from  pagan  thought.  This  has  been  done  by 
the  church  in  every  century.  In  noting  the  time 
element  in  New-Testament  thought,  we  should 
remember  that  Christianity  did  not  grow  up 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  29 


in  a  cloister  but  was  thrown  from  the  beginning 
into  the  full  current  of  the  world.  ‘‘The  new 
religion  found  its  converts  among  philosophers 
of  all  schools,  votaries  of  all  religions,  moralists, 
social  reformers,  rich  and  poor.”^^  In  the 
process  of  development  it  assimilated  pagan 
elements,  but  this  interaction  only  tended  to 
preserve  the  distinctive  character  of  Chris¬ 
tianity.  It  was  thus  increasingly  acknowledged 
as  the  only  religion  which  “expresses  in  their 
purity  and  with  a  clear  consciousness  of  their 
value  and  meaning,  those  elements  in  human 
thought  which  can  properly  be  called  reli¬ 
gious.”^^  This  conflict  between  Christianity 
and  the  religions  of  the  first  century  is  being 
repeated  to-day  on  the  mission  field,  especially 
in  India,  and  the  reactions  are  full  of  significance 
so  far  as  our  thought  at  home  is  concerned. 

The  differences  in  doctrinal  expression  dim¬ 
ing  the  successive  centuries  have,  however,  not 
destroyed  but  maintained  the  continuity  of 
spiritual  faith  and  life.  Our  own  peril  is  in 
being  tempted  to  stereotype  doctrine  and  cus- 

E.  F.  Scott:  The  New  Testament  Today,  p.  41.  Re¬ 
printed  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company,  Pub¬ 
lishers,  New  York  City. 

^  Ihid.,  p.  75. 

Compare  W.  S.  Urquhart:  Theosophy  and  Christian 
Thought,  and  Campbell  N.  Moody:  The  Mind  of  the  Early 
Converts, 


30 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


tom,  and  to  arrest  the  development  of  truth, 
regardless  of  the  growth  of  human  knowledge. 
“The  traditional  Christian  lives  in  a  pre- 
Copernican  universe  and  refuses  to  readjust 
his  cosmology,  which  fits  only  into  a  geocentric 
frame.  .  .  .  The  new  knowledge  imposes  upon 
us  new  duties;  and  these  new  duties  are  sys¬ 
tematically  ignored  by  churches,  which  even 
manifest  an  active  antipathy  to  them.”^^  The 
Roman  Church  is  the  extreme  instance  of  the 
church  which  forgets  nothing  and  learns 
nothing.  The  genius  of  Protestantism  encour¬ 
ages  the  forward  look,  but  it  cannot  be  said 
that  Protestantism  has  consistently  practiced 
it.  We  are  still  encumbered  by  the  scholas¬ 
ticism  of  the  sixteenth  century,  and  we  behave 
as  though  the  last  word  was  spoken  by  Luther 
or  Calvin.  The  ancient  creeds  are  limited  by 
what  they  contain  and  by  what  they  omit. 
“They  are  declarations  of  dogma,  not  directions 
of  life.  They  codify  Christian  opinion  rather 
than  modify  Christian  character.  As  has 
been  stated  elsewhere:  “We  trust  them  with 
reverence  as  milestones  in  the  path  of  Christian 
progress;  but  we  do  not  regard  them  as  final 


Inge:  Ovtspolcen  Essays,  Second  Series,  p.  56. 

^  F.  G.  Peabody:  The  Christian  Life  in  the  Modern  World, 
p.  202.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Com¬ 
pany,  Publishers,  New  York  City. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  31 


decisions,  closing  the  doors  for  further  investi¬ 
gation  and  achievement  or  preventing  yet 
larger  discoveries  of  the  inexhaustible  wealth 
of  divine  grace. 

Any  changes  contemplated,  and  those  that 
have  already  been  adopted,  affect  what  is 
vital  in  Christianity,  not  to  undermine  it  but 
to  illuminate  and  enhance  it.  Much  of  the 
confusion  in  the  Protestant  camp  to-day  has 
been  occasioned  by  a  doctrine  of  biblical 
authority  which  has  failed  to  distinguish  be¬ 
tween  dictation  and  inspiration.  If  the  Bible 
were  divinely  dictated,  then  those  who  wrote 
were  not  “moved  by  the  Holy  Spirit”  but 
conscripted  by  the  Holy  Spirit  to  take  down 
what  was  given  them,  as  though  they  were 
a  registering  machine  without  any  exercise  of 
their  intellectual  or  spiritual  faculties.  In  that 
case  every  part  of  the  Bible  is  equally  sacred 
— Leviticus  as  much  as  the  Psalms,  Lamenta¬ 
tions  as  the  Gospel  of  John.  However  strongly 
this  mechanical  theory  might  be  held,  in  prac¬ 
tice  it  is  virtually  discarded  even  by  those 
who  espouse  it,  except  when  they  convert  the 
Bible  into  an  arsenal  of  proof-texts  to  sub¬ 
stantiate  any  doctrine,  be  it  Christian  or  anti- 

Oscar  L.  Joseph:  Freedom  and  Advance,  p.  6.  Reprinted 
with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company,  Publishers, 
New  York  City. 


32 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


Christian.  This  is  being  done  by  the  prop¬ 
agandists  of  Millennialism,  Russellism,  Second 
Adventism,  Spiritualism,  who  confound  the 
unlearned  and  tantalize  the  thoughtful  by  their 
intolerant  obscurantism. 

There  are  two  classes  of  Christians  to  whom 
preachers  must  always  appeal.  The  apostle 
Paul  said:  “We  speak  wisdom,  however,  among 
them  that  are  fullgrown”;  and  he  censured 
the  Corinthians  because  he  could  not  speak  to 
them  as  unto  spiritual  but  as  unto  babes  in 
Christ. The  writer  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews  urged  his  readers  to  leave  the  doctrine 
of  the  first  principles  of  Christ  and  to  press 
on  unto  full  growth.  He  recognized  that 
there  are  ordinary  believers,  satisfied  with 
elementary  teaching,  who  live  from  hand  to 
mouth  and  who  are  content  to  continue  in 
this  grade  of  experience.  There  are  others, 
however,  who  desire  to  proceed  to  higher 
“knowledge,”  to  understand  the  mystery  of 
godliness  in  the  incarnate  Christ  and  its  man¬ 
ifest  claims  upon  life.^^  It  must  not  be  inferred 
that  we  are  to  talk  a  learned  language  in  the 
pulpit  to  these  latter.  We  should,  however, 
express  the  truth  in  lucid  fashion  and  in  its 


1  Corinthians  2.  6;  3.  1. 
Hebrews  6.  1. 

1  Timothy  3.  16. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  33 


comprehensive  aspects  that  lead  to  greater 
privileges  and  make  for  larger  responsibilities. 
When  we  endeavor  to  answer  the  intellectual 
doubts  and  problems  of  those  who  seek  for 
light  from  Chi'istianity,  there  should  be 
such  a  directness  as  will  help  even  those  in 
the  other  grade  of  Christian  thought  and 
experience. 

Here,  then,  is  the  issue.  We  cannot  put  off 
earnest  inquirers  by  evasive  answers  and 
passionate  assertions,  which  really  betray  “in¬ 
tellectual  frugality”  on  our  part.  These  may 
be  in  the  minority,  but  their  influence  is  far 
in  excess  of  their  numbers;  and  it  would  be 
fatal  to  the  cause  of  Christianity  to  ignore 
them  in  exclusive  preference  for  the  multitudes. 
Bishop  Gore  observed  that  a  serious  danger 
threatens  the  church  when  her  ministers  “take 
refuge  in  social  and  practical  interests  from  the 
difficulties  of  thought.”  He  says  that  one 
reason  why  so  many  people  do  not  find  spiritual 
advantage  in  listening  to  preachers  is  that  the 
preaching  gives  them  little  to  think  about. 
“A  rambling  and  incoherent  sermon,  inter¬ 
spersed  with  trite  observations  and  conven¬ 
tional  platitudes,  is  heard  with  hardly  con¬ 
cealed  impatience,  and  a  preacher  of  this  type 
soon  finds  his  congregation  deserting  him.  The 
horror  of  the  dull  and  tedious  is  a  note  of  our 


34 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


day.”-°  This  does  not  imply  that  we  are  to 
convert  the  pulpit  into  a  theological  chair  and 
the  congregation  into  a  class  of  theologues. 
It  means,  rather,  that  the  pulpit  should  be 
made  the  magnetic  center,  from  which  there 
shall  go  forth  the  radiance  of  light,  the  rejuve¬ 
nescence  of  life,  and  the  redemption  of  love. 
Thus  only  will  those  who  attend  our  services 
be  enabled  to  worship  in  the  beauty  of  holiness; 
to  meditate  in  the  atmosphere  of  decorum  and 
dignity;  to  praise  in  the  fellowship  of  spiritual 
uplift;  and  to  go  forth,  under  the  spell  of  eter¬ 
nal  peace,  to  live  soberly,  righteously,  and 
godly  in  this  present  world. 

We  believe  that  Christianity  has  the  only 
message  for  these  distracted  times,  because 
Jesus  Christ  is  the  Lord  of  thought,  the  Ruler 
of  the  emotions,  the  Controller  of  the  will, 
the  Director  of  activity,  and  the  Redeemer 
of  all  life.  To  be  sure,  the  challenge  is  not  an 
easy  one,  when  preachers  are  called  upon  to 
serve  tables  and  to  discharge  eleemosynary 
functions.  The  other  day  Dr.  J.  D.  Jones 
made  this  statement:  “Doctor  Jowett  once 
said  to  me  that  what  he  valued  most  at  Carr’s 
Lane  was  that  his  deacons  gave  him  an  abso- 


20  Galloway:  Religion  and  Modern  Thought,  p.  51. 

21  Titus  2.  12. 


THOUGHTS  FOR  TRANSITION  TIMES  35 


lutely  quiet  mind.  How  can  any  minister  do 
his  best  work  if  he  is  harassed  and  worried  by 
a  hundred  anxieties?”  We  all  feel  the  same. 
Among  other  things,  it  should,  then,  be  our 
business  to  train  our  laymen  so  that  they 
will  take  a  fuller  share  in  the  work  of  the 
church,  in  order  that  the  minister  may  give 
himself  to  his  work  as  a  preacher,  a  teacher,  a 
pastor,  and  the  leader  of  his  people  in  all 
ways  that  build  up  the  church  for  the  further¬ 
ance  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  In  spite  of  diffi¬ 
culties  our  work  must  be  done.  Let  us  accept 
our  task  with  the  courage  of  consecration,  and 
prove  ourselves  more  expert  stewards  of  the 
manifold  grace  of  God,  rightly  dividing  the 
word  of  Truth,  for  the  edification  of  the  church 
and  the  redemption  of  the  world. 


36 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


SUGGESTED  READING' 

George  Galloway:  Religion  and  Modem  Thought, 

Gerald  B.  Smith,  Editor:  A  Guide  to  the  Study 
of  the  Christian  Religion. 

Oscar  L.  Joseph:  Freedom  and  Advance. 

W.  T.  Davison,  Editor:  The  Chief  Corner-Stone. 

John  Oman:  The  Problem  of  Faith  and  Freedom. 

F.  G.  Peabody:  The  Christian  Life  in  the  Mod¬ 
ern  World. 

H.  R.  Mackintosh:  The  Originality  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  Message. 

A.  S.  Peake:  The  Nature  of  Scripture. 

David  S.  Cairns:  The  Reasonableness  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  Faith. 

H.  B.  Williams:  Fundamentals  of  Faith  in  the 
Light  of  Modern  Thought. 

George  Cross:  Creative  Christianity. 

Lily  Dougall  and  Cyril  W.  Emmet:  The  Lord  of 
Thought. 

Benedetto  Croce :  History:  Its  Theory  and  Practice. 

W.  R.  Inge:  Outspoken  Essays.  I  and  II  Series. 

T.  R.  Glover:  Progress  in  Religion  to  the  Christian 
Era. 

Robert  F.  Horton:  The  Mystical  Quest  of  Christ. 

Arthur  K.  Rogers:  English  and  American  Philos¬ 
ophy  Since  1800. 

F.  Melian  Stawell  and  F.  S.  Marvin:  The  Making 
of  the  Western  Mind.  A  Short  Review  of  European 
Culture. 

Henry  T.  Hodgkin:  The  Christian  Revolution. 

Charles  D.  Williams:  The  Gospel  of  Fellowship. 

A.  Boyd  Scott:  Nevertheless  We  Believe. 

^  Any  desired  book  in  these  lists  of  “Suggested  Reading” 
may  be  secured  from  your  own  publisher. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM 


“Prove  all  things;  hold  fast  that  which  is  good.” 
— 1  Thessalonians  5.  21. 

“It  would  seem  that  there  can  be  no  greater 
necessity  than  that  of  making  decisively  clear,  if 
this  be  possible,  whether  in  professing  to  know 
religious  facts  we  are  dealing  with  realities  that 
are  intelligible,  or  with  the  fictitious  products  of  our 
imagination  and  the  confused  emanations  of  our 
desires.  And  there  can  be  no  necessity  more  urgent 
if,  as  most  men  would  confess,  a  man’s  religion 
expresses  and  determines  his  attitude  toward  life 
as  a  whole.  Whatever  else  religion  has  meant  to 
man — and  it  is  difficult  to  say  what  it  has  not 
meant — it  may  be  said  that  where  the  religious 
issue  has  never  been  raised,  man’s  life  drifts.  He 
has  not  faced  its  meaning,  nor  has  his  life  any 
dominant  purpose.  He  has  not  fixed  its  standard 
of  values,  nor  determined  what  must  be  sought 
first.  He  is  like  one  storm-driven  in  mid-ocean 
without  a  star  whereby  to  steer,  or  any  land  in 
any  direction  for  which  to  make.  .  .  .  Religious 
faith  cannot  be  otiose  nor  can  religious  doubt  or 
error  be  innocuous.  For  religion  is  a  practical  mat¬ 
ter,  and  so  indeed  is  irreligion.  Uncertainty  in 
religion  means  hesitancy  in  action,  and  paralyzes 
the  will  the  more  tragically  the  more  far  reaching 
the  issues.” — Sir  Henry  Jones:  A  Faith  that 
Enquires,  p.  3.^ 

^  Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


CHAPTER  II 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM 

The  rise  of  Protestantism  in  the  sixteenth 
century  was  the  result  of  revolutionary  forces 
that  were  struggling  for  expression  during 
many  years  in  the  intellectual,  political,  eco¬ 
nomic,  social  and  religious  realms  of  life.  It 
was  a  period  seething  with  discontent  and 
full  of  bitter  class  hatreds,  second  only  to 
that  in  which  we  are  living.  The  protest  was 
negative,  against  the  autocratic  domination  of 
institutionalism  in  church  and  State,  which 
regarded  humanity  as  existing  for  ecclesias¬ 
tical  and  imperial  exploitation.  It  was  also 
a  positive  protest,  on  behalf  of  the  rights  of 
personal  freedom  based  on  reason  and  con¬ 
science.  It  was  the  first  serious  attempt  in 
any  large  way  to  break  from  traditional  bond¬ 
age.  It  had  many  immaturities,  as  was  inev¬ 
itable,  but  it  turned  the  course  of  human  life 
into  better  channels.  It  found  its  voice  in 
Luther,  who  was  a  Providential  man,  in  the 
sense  that  there  was  focussed  in  his  volatile 
and  forceful  personality  the  divers  currents  of 

39 


40 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


thought,  emotion,  and  will,  which  had  their 
origin  before  his  birth.  His  strident  voice  was 
heard  above  all  others,  but  we  should  not 
overlook  his  contemporaries,  who  were  working 
for  the  same  cause  of  freedom,  even  though 
they  were  often  at  cross-purposes.  Erasmus, 
the  rationalist,  Melanchthon  the  moralist, 
Zwingli  the  eclectic,  Calvin  the  logician  and 
administrator  were  among  those  who  shook 
the  foundations  of  error  and  who  endeavored 
to  substitute  something  better  on  which  to 
build  a  more  stable  and  comprehensive  struc¬ 
ture,  for  the  greater  glory  of  God  and  the 
larger  good  of  humankind. 

It  ill  becomes  us  to  pass  censorious  judgment 
on  the  imperfections  and  failures  of  these 
strategic  men.  It  is  more  to  the  point  to  real¬ 
ize  the  significance  of  their  achievement.  They 
destroyed  the  shackles  that  bound  the  human 
mind.  Some  were  thereby  cast  on  an  un¬ 
charted  sea,  others  happily  discovered  their 
moorings  and  obtained  secure  anchorage.  To 
be  sure,  the  Reformation  raised  more  problems 
than  it  was  able  to  answer,  but  what  a  big 
thing  it  was  to  get  men  out  of  the  inertia  of 
intellectual  and  spiritual  vassalage  and  to  com¬ 
pel  them  to  seek  more  acceptable  and  more 
respectable  ways  of  realizing  their  immortal 
destiny.  “It  was  the  logic  of  events  that. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  41 


whereas  the  Renaissance  gave  freedom  of 
thought  to  the  cultivated  few,  the  Reformation 
finally  resulted  in  tolerance  for  the  masses. 
Logically  also,  even  while  it  feared  and  hated 
philosophy  in  the  great  thinkers  and  scientists, 
it  advocated  education,  up  to  a  certain  point, 
for  the  masses.  If  the  Reformation  is  judged 
with  historical  imagination,  it  does  not  appear 
to  be  primarily  a  reaction.  That  it  should  be 
such  is  both  a  priori  improbable  and  unsup¬ 
ported  by  the  facts.  The  Reformation  did  not 
give  our  answer  to  the  many  problems  it  was 
called  upon  to  face;  nevertheless,  it  gave  the 
solution  demanded  and  accepted  by  the  time, 
and  therefore  historically  the  valid  solution. 
With  all  its  limitations  it  was  fundamentally  a 
step  forward  and  not  the  return  to  an  earlier 
standpoint,  either  to  that  of  primitive  Chris¬ 
tianity,  as  the  reformers  themselves  claimed, 
or  to  the  dark  ages,  as  has  been  latterly 
asserted.”^  Luther’s  position  at  first  was 
moderate  but  the  compelling  force  of  circum¬ 
stances,  the  enlargement  and  revision  of  thought 
and  the  direction  of  events,  led  him  later  to 
assume  a  radical  attitude.  “Only  gradually,” 

2  Preserved  Smith:  The  Age  of  the  Reformation,  p.  750. 
Reprinted  with  permission  of  Henry  Holt  and  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City.  Compare  H.  O.  Taylor:  Thought 
and  Expression  in  the  Sixteenth  Century,  vol.  ii,  383  ff. 


42 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


wrote  Dr.  Alfred  Plummer,  ‘‘did  he  reach  the 
position  that  a  man  can  be  saved  apart  from 
the  Pope;  and  he  ended  by  saying  that  a  man 
cannot  be  saved  unless  he  opposes  the  Pope.”^ 

The  Reformation,  that  is  to  say,  emphasized 
the  principle  of  development  in  religious  thought 
and  life.  This  was  against  the  static  principle 
which,  in  a  spirit  of  half  distrust  due  to  lack 
of  faith  in  the  creative  God  of  redemption, 
insists  on  the  status  quo,  beyond  which  no  one 
should  go  on  peril  of  eternal  loss.  The  Re¬ 
formers  did  not  realize  all  the  implications  in 
the  progressive  ideal  of  religious  liberty,  nor 
could  they  have  been  expected  to  do  so,  since 
they  had  not  yet  completely  emancipated 
themselves  from  the  incubus  of  medisevalism. 
They  were  heralds  of  the  better  day  and 
pioneers  of  a  movement  which  has  had  a  check¬ 
ered  course  up  to  our  own  time.  Their  answer 
was  the  best  they  could  give,  and  we  think  of 
it,  not  to  go  back  to  it  but  to  go  forward  from 
it.  We  should  receive  it  at  its  face  value  and 
furnish  a  fuller  answer,  more  commensurate 
with  our  ability  and  more  adequate  to  our 
needs. 

Criticism  is  always  a  preliminary  step  toward 

^  Quoted  by  Jackson  and  Lake:  The  Beginnings  of  Chris^ 
tianity,  vol.  ii,  p.  292.  The  Macmillan  Company,  Publishers, 
New  York  City. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  43 

progress.  It  is  a  healthy  sign,  not  to  be  de¬ 
plored,  even  when  much  of  it  is  hasty  and 
biased.  It  is  indeed  a  mark  of  growing  interest, 
so  much  better  than  the  perilous  attitude  of 
indifference.  It  is,  furthermore,  an  indication 
of  the  desire  for  improvement.  Dean  Inge  well 
said  that  ‘‘a  movement  has  more  to  fear  from 
its  disciples  than  from  its  critics.”^  If  we  are 
alert  and  open-minded,  we  might  learn  more 
from  those  with  whom  we  disagree  than  from 
those  who  indorse  our  sentiments.  The  real 
seeker  after  truth  is  more  anxious  to  be  con¬ 
vinced  than  to  be  confirmed.  For  instance, 
the  primary  aim  in  reading  a  book  labeled 
“not  safe”  is  to  get  the  point  of  view  of  the 
man  with  whom  we  disagree  rather  than  to 
detect  errors,  which  would  become  more  patent 
to  the  sympathetic  than  to  the  merely  antag¬ 
onistic  reader.  Progress  comes  through  the 
clash  of  ideas  and  not  by  passive  acquiescence. 
The  word  progress  is  by  no  means  an  open 
sesame.  Some  who  declare  for  progress  may 
be  as  obscurantist  as  those  who  deny  it.°  On 
no  subject  is  it  more  necessary  to  heed  Doctor 
Johnson’s  advice,  “Clear  your  mind  of  cant.” 
In  this  case  the  cant  is  the  confused  thought 

*  Outspoken  Essays,  Second  Series,  p.  184. 

®  Compare  J.  B.  Bury:  The  Idea  of  Progress,  An  Enquiry 
into  its  Origin  and  Growth. 


44 


THE  DYNAlSnC  MNISTRY 


which  mistakes  phrases  for  processes  and 
places  an  embargo  on  free  thinking  so  necessary’’ 
for  a  right  understanding  of  the  central  issues. 
The  course  of  history  has  been  cataclysmic 
and  constructive.  When  the  church  has  faced 
a  crisis  with  the  conscious  ability  of  spiritual 
direction,  and  when  her  representatives  have 
shown  candor  and  conviction,  the  outcome  has 
invariably  been  one  of  religious  and  moral 
advance.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  church 
has  yielded  to  the  adroit  ways  of  compromise, 
she  has  unwittingly  belittled  the  magisterial 
demands  of  Truth,  to  find  herself  in  wander¬ 
ing  mazes  lost. 

Bishop  Butler  in  the  Advertisement  to  The 
Analogy  of  Religion,  wrote:  ‘Tt  is  come,  I 
know  not  how,  to  be  taken  for  granted,  by 
many  persons,  that  Christianity  is  not  so 
much  a  subject  of  inquiry,  but  that  it  is 
now  at  length  discovered  to  be  fictitious.  And 
accordingly  they  treat  it  as  if,  in  the  present 
age,  this  were  an  agreed  point  among  all  people 
of  discernment,  and  nothing  remained  but  to 
set  it  up  as  a  principal  subject  of  mirth  and 
ridicule,  as  it  were,  by  way  of  reprisals  for  its 
so  long  having  interrupted  the  pleasures  of  the 
world.  On  the  contrary,  this  much,  at  least, 
will  be  here  found — not  taken  for  granted,  but 
proved — that  any  reasonable  man  who  will 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  45 


thoroughly  consider  the  matter  may  be  as 
much  assured  as  he  is  of  his  own  being  that 
it  is  not,  however,  so  clear  a  case  that  there 
is  nothing  in  it.  There  is,  I  think,  strong  evi¬ 
dence  of  its  truth;  but  it  is  certain  no  one 
can,  upon  principles  of  reason,  be  satisfied  of 
the  contrary.  And  the  practical  consequence 
to  be  drawn  from  this  is  not  attended  to  by 
every  one  who  is  concerned  in  it.”®  It  is  to  the 
credit  of  Bishop  Butler  that  he  compelled 
thinking  men  to  reconsider  their  attitude  to 
Christianity,  and  made  it  clear  to  them  that 
it  was  not  based  on  unreason  and  superstition, 
but  that  it  was  in  perfect  harmony  with  the 
most  exacting  demands  of  reason  and  con¬ 
science.  He  did  what  many  were  thinking 
about  but  were  unable  to  utter.  The  Evan- 
gehcal  Revival  was  so  eflFective  because  of  the 
severe  intellectual  labors  of  the  lonely  thinker 
of  Auckland  Castle.  It  has  always  been  true 
that  the  thinkers  have  laid  the  foundations 
and  the  mystics  have  built  thereon.  They 
hewed  a  way  through  the  forests  of  ignorance, 
the  jungles  of  superstition,  the  mountains  of 
prejudice,  often  at  serious  cost  to  themselves. 
They  seldom  received  the  just  mead  of  appre¬ 
ciation,  but  they  were  sustained  by  the  con- 


“  W.  E.  Gladstone’s  edition,  vol.  i,  p.  1.  The  Macmillan 
Company. 


46 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


viction  that  they  were  the  servants  of  the 
Most  High  and  had  received  their  commission 
not  from  councils  and  svnods  but  from  the 

V 

Eternal  God  himself. 

The  thinker  is  seldom  welcome,  however 
indispensable  he  may  be  to  the  cause  of  truth. 
This  is  doubtless  because  he  has  an  uncom¬ 
fortable  way  of  holding  us  to  our  premises  and 
compelling  us  to  reach  conclusions  which  often 
do  violence  to  our  cherished  presuppositions. 
As  Robinson  well  remarks,  ‘‘Most  of  our  so- 
called  reasoning  consists  in  finding  arguments 
for  going  on  believing  as  we  already  do.  .  .  . 
Instead  of  subjecting  traditional  ideas  and 
rules  to  a  thoroughgoing  reconsideration,  our 
impulse  is  to  hasten  to  justify  existing  and 
habitual  notions  of  human  conduct.”^  We 
thus  continue  to  plow  the  sands  and  beat  the 
air  and  travel  in  a  vicious  circle  of  familiar 
activities  that  begin  and  end  nowhere;  and 
when  it  is  shown  that  we  are  mistaken  we 
express  our  resentment  by  abuse,  because  of 
a  native  incapacity  for  genuine  argument.  Is 
this  not  the  tragic  story  of  the  church  which 
has  slain  her  prophets  in  one  generation  and 
builded  monuments  to  their  honor  in  a  later 

^  J.  H.  Robinson:  The  Mind  in  the  Making,  pp.  41,  199. 
Reprinted  with  permission  of  Harper  &  Brothers,  Publishers, 
New  York  City. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  47 


generation,  to  atone  for  her  lack  of  vision  and 
forethought?  And  yet  the  lesson  has  not  been 
learned,  so  that  we  continue  to  treat  our  con¬ 
secrated  and  courageous  thinkers  as  the  most 
dangerous  enemies  of  God  and  man.  ‘‘Never¬ 
theless,  wisdom  is  vindicated  by  all  that  she 
does,”  to  use  Moffatt’s  rendering  of  these 
words  of  the  Master.^ 

Definitions  are  invariably  misleading.  This 
refers  especially  to  definitions  of  truth  which 
cannot  be  “cribbed,  coffined  and  confined,” 
in  sentences,  however  stately  and  sonorous 
they  may  be.  Who  can  define  life  which  is 
subject  to  change  in  an  unbroken  continuity 
from  the  evolution  of  the  embryo  to  the  com¬ 
plete  and  complex  organism?  It  is  being 
constantly  transformed  as  it  develops  new 
forms  of  expression  in  accordance  with  the 
exigencies  of  circumstances.  Since  religion  is 
life,  inspired  by  the  supreme  God  with  whom 
the  pious  hold  communion,  this  same  feature 
characterizes  the  growth  of  religion,  as  it 
advances  from  less  to  more,  even  toward  a 
fuller  apprehension  of  and  a  closer  conformity 
to  the  whole  will  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ  our 
Lord.  Religion  so  conceived  recognizes  no 
cleft  between  itself  and  thought  but,  rather. 


®  Matthew  11.  19. 


48 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


welcomes  the  prerogatives  of  doubt,  the  rights 
of  inquiry,  the  privileges  of  free  discussion, 
and  it  encourages  opportunities  for  independent 
initiative  looking  toward  the  greater  expansive¬ 
ness  and  the  richer  benefactions  of  truth. 
Such  a  religion  maintains  the  forward  look  and 
therefore  distinguishes  between  traditionalism 
which  is  domination  by  the  past  and  tradition 
which  is  respect  for  the  past.  This  was  the 
idea  of  Jesus  who  interpreted  religion  in  terms 
of  life  and  who  made  more  of  the  authority  of 
the  enlightened  reason  than  of  the  authorities 
of  ancient  doctrinanes.  He  set  the  issue 
forcibly  before  his  hearers  when  he  asked  them 
with  startling  directness:  ‘‘And  why  even  of 
yourselves  judge  ye  not  what  is  right.^”^  Have 
you  ever  heard  or  preached  a  sermon  on  this 
revolutionary  text?  It  asserts  the  rights  of 
reason  far  more  decisively  than  many  of  his 
other  sayings.  It  should,  however,  be  said 
that  the  entire  tenor  of  the  Master’s  ministry 
was  to  get  away  from  the  aridities  and  futil¬ 
ities  of  traditionalism  and  to  find  refuge  and 
rest  in  the  enriching  hospitality  of  the  mind  and 
heart  of  God,  which  fathom  the  depths,  and  scale 
the  heights,  and  encompass  the  breadths  of  life, 
with  surpassing  ability  and  reliability. 


®  Luke  12.  57. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  49 


Think  for  yourselves  and  decide  for  your¬ 
selves — this  is  the  insistent  summons  of  our 
blessed  Lord,  whose  directions  offer  real  deliv¬ 
erance  and  lead  to  genuine  peace  and  blessed¬ 
ness.  We  are  apt  to  look  with  suspicion  on  the 
man  who  asks  questions  and  who  does  not 
passively  accept  things  as  they  are  in  the 
laissez  faire  spirit.  We  are  inclined  to  regard 
doubt  as  sinful  and  to  view  faith  as  an.unques- 
tioned  acceptance  divorced  from  reason.  A 
faith  that  has  to  be  shielded  as  a  hothouse 
plant  because  it  cannot  stand  the  withering 
blasts  of  criticism,  and  v/hich  has  to  be  bol¬ 
stered  up  by  authorities  and  to  be  accepted  at 
secondhand  by  those  who  do  not  want  to  be 
exercised  by  the  inconvenience  and  exhaustion 
of  thinking,  is  not  faith  but  superstition. 
Hence  the  misunderstanding  about  the  realities 
of  life  which  are  intelligible  only  as  they  appeal 
to  reason.  WTiat  is  unintelligible  is  irrational, 
and  this  is  true  of  religion  and  every  other 
subject.  If  I  have  to  be  religious  by  insulting 
or  hurting  my  reason,  which  is  the  light  of 
the  Divine  Spirit  in  me,  then  so  far  my  religion 
is  defective.  ‘‘A  Gentleman  with  a  Duster,’’ 
in  his  latest  volume.  Painted  Windows,  has 
pointed  out  the  dangers  to  which  we  are  exposed 
when  reason  is .  discounted  or  neglected.  In 
his  earlier  volume.  The  Mirrors  of  Downing 


50 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


Street,  lie  declared:  “We  need  the  Puritan 
element  in  our  character,  the  Hellenic  element 
in  our  minds,  and  the  Christian  element  in 
our  souls.  We  must  set  a  higher  value  on 
moral  qualities,  on  intellectual  qualities,  and  on 
Christian  qualities.  We  must  learn  to  see  not 
gloomily  nor  heavily,  but  with  joy  and  thanks¬ 
giving,  that  our  world  is  set  in  the  midst  of  an 
infinite  universe,  that  it  has  a  purpose  in  the 
scheme  of  things,  that  we  are  aU  members 
one  of  another,  and  that  there  is  no  grandeur 
of  character,  mind,  or  soul  which  can  ever  be 
worthy  of  creation’s  purpose.”^® 

The  secret  of  Jesus  was  in  his  firm  “faith 
in  the  absolute  supremacy  of  spirit.”  In  that 
searching  question,  just  mentioned,  Jesus  ap¬ 
pealed  to  the  innate  understanding  of  his 
hearers.  They  were  able  to  forecast  the  weather 
as  the  result  of  experience;  why  did  they  not 
show  a  similar  atbility  to  interpret  the  intel¬ 
lectual,  social,  and  religious  currents  of  con¬ 
temporary  life?  In  a  profound  sense  Jesus 
was  both  rationalist  and  idealist  because  his 
life  was  established  in  spiritual  depths  through 
fellowship  with  God.  The  attitude  of  indiffer¬ 
ence  does  not  see,  the  attitude  of  curiosity 

-  ^ 

The  Mirrors  of  Downing  Street,  p.  171.  Reprinted  with 

permission  of  G.  P.  Putnam’s  Sons,  Publishers,  New  York 

City. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  51 


fails  to  see,  the  attitude  of  self-interest  cannot 
see,  the  attitude  of  faith  is  one  of  sober  reason¬ 
ableness  because  it  does  see,  and  sees  straight 
and  sees  far,  and  enables  others  to  see.  It  is 
in  the  spirit  of  faith  that  we  must  face  our 
complex  situation.  In  this  day  of  revolt  and 
rebellion  against  conventional  standards  and 
tests,  when  every  institution  including  the 
church  is  under  fire,  an  evasive  course  spells 
disaster.  Criticism,  moreover,  is  only  a  half¬ 
way  house.  We  must  continue^ our  journey 
beyond  it,  by  means  of  the  creative  thought 
of  construction,  which  accepts  the  challenge 
of  the  critic,  to  give  a  reason  for  the  faith 
and  the  faith  in  us,  with  consistency,  open- 
mindedness,  and  calmness,  that  characterize 
the  possessors  of  knowledge  and  assurance. 

We  are  to  live  on  inspirations,  not  on  sensa¬ 
tions.  W^e  should  be  influenced  by  sentiment, 
not  by  sentimentalism.  We  must  insist,  not 
on  the  random  repetition  of  shibboleths  but 
on  the  steady  acknowledgment  of  sanctity 
revealed  in  Christ  and  exhibited  in  Christian 
experience.  The  failure  to  make  the  dis¬ 
tinction  between  the  truth  of  Christianity 
and  its  varying  interpretations  is  the  cause 
of  endless  confusion  among  pious  souls  who 
mistake  the  means  for  the  end,  because  they 
have  not  been  accustomed  to  discriminate 


52 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


between  the  essentials  and  the  accidentals  of 
our  holy  religion.  These  carry  Protestant 
scholasticism  to  the  extreme  of  absurdity  and 
in  their  zeal  for  literalism  they  discounte¬ 
nance  all  the  new  knowledge  that  has  come 
to  us  through  biolog;^^  psychology,  compara¬ 
tive  religion,  biblical  scholarship,  philosophy, 
and  other  subjects  of  learning.  They  fail  to 
see  that  this  new  light  has  given  a  richer  radi¬ 
ance  to  the  manifold  gospel  of  our  redemption, 
and  that  we  are  thus  enabled  to  separate  the 
chaff  from  the  wheat,  to  distinguish  between 
what  is  fundamental  and  subsidiary,  to  stress 
the  central  things  with  intelligent  earnestness, 
and  to  be  charitably  tolerant  toward  those 
w^ho  differ  with  us  in  lesser  matters.  One  out¬ 
standing  impression  of  the  New  Testament, 
as  we  have  already  seen,  is  that  the  early 
church  enjoyed  divers  expressions  of  thought 
in  keeping  with  the  one  impression  of  the 
blessed  Spirit  of  Christ.  This  is  a  truth  seldom 
seriously  reckoned  with  by  ecclesiasticism.  Even 
the  Lambeth  Appeal  could  not  get  away  from 
the  fallacious  theory  of  the  “historic  episco¬ 
pate,”  and  argued  in  a  circle  about  reordination 
not  being  necessarily  a  repudiation  of  former 
ministerial  ordinations  but  expedient  to  officiate 
in  Anglicanism.  The  gain  that  would  follow 
such  a  surrender  of  the  convictions  of  spiritual 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  53 


freedom  is  at  best  of  doubtful  value.  What  is 
obtained,  at  the  cost  of  unreason  and  evasion 
and  an  implicit  denial  of  the  historic  minis¬ 
trations  of  Protestantism,  cannot  serve  the 
cause  of  Christianity,  nor  bring  good  out  of 
evil.  Whatever  may  be  our  defects,  let  us  not 
be  guilty  of  a  lack  of  self-respect  and  discard 
our  holy  heritage  for  a  will-o’-the-wisp.^^ 

V  Since  we  have  received  a  better  perspective, 
we  are  not  chary  of  opinions  that  are  steps 
leading  up  to  the  citadel  of  truth.  But  we 
protest  against  opinionativeness  which  is  akin 
to  bigotry,  and  which,  if  allowed  its  way, 
would  use  the  methods  of  the  Inquisition  to 
compel  Christians  to  renounce  their  precious 
privilege  to  think  sanely,  and  instead  to  accept 
submissively  its  dogmatic  decisions.  In  a 
luminous  essay  on  “Rome  as  Unreformed,” 
Dr.  G.  G.  Coulton  writes:  “No  other  society 
that  claims  a  moment’s  respect  from  the  mod¬ 
ern  mind  has  ever  organized  brute  force  so 
elaborately  for  the  suppression  of  differences 
of  opinion,  or  has  had  such  logical  justification 
for  this  wickedness.” If  we  refuse  the  just 

A  more  chastened  spirit  is,  however,  seen  in  The  Lambeth 
Joint  Report  on  Church  Unity.  A  Discussion  by  Members 
of  the  Lambeth  Joint  Conference  (Hodder  and  Stoughton, 
Publishers). 

^Anglican  Essays,  p.  112.  Reprinted  with  permission  of 
The  Macmillan  Company,  Publishers,  New  York  City. 


54 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


demand  to  bring  every  question  before  the 
impartial  bar  of  reason,  then  the  alternative  is 
to  accept  the  authority  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  It  has  at  least  the  merit  of  con¬ 
sistency,  and,  within  prescribed  limits,  appeals 
to  the  spectacular  and  spiritual  instincts  of 
the  soul  more  impressively  than  the  pseudo 
claims  of  an  inconsistent  Protestantism,  which 
only  emphasizes  what  is  convenient  to  its 
tastes  ahd  overlooks  the  uncomfortable  because 
sacrificial  mandates  of  religion.  Witness  the 
multitudinous  sectarianisms  which  advertise  the 
selfish  passions  and  heartless  self-will  of  those 
who,  in  their  strife  for  triumph  more  than 
truth,  would  either  rule  or  ruin.  We  accept 
neither  alternative  because  there  is  a  yet 
better  way. 

As  Protestants  we  should  cultivate  the  spirit 
of  research  in  questions  of  religious  faith, 
assured  that  such  a  method  would  enrich  the 
grasp  and  experience  of  our  faith  beyond  our 
fondest  expectations.  Unless  religion  appeals 
to  the  informed  intelligence  it  cannot  hold  the 
attention  and  secure  the  allegiance  of  thought¬ 
ful  souls.  The  historical  creeds  and  confessions 
are  “declarations  of  dogma,  not  directions 
for  life.”  Judged  from  our  standpoint  they 
are  wanting  in  fullness  of  expression.  Instead 
of  ruthlessly  discarding  them,  they  should  be 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  55 


considered  on  their  merits,  in  the  light  of  the 
complete  revelation  of  Christ,  unfolded  in  the 
New  Testament  and  exemplified  in  varying 
degrees  of  accuracy  by  the  history  of  the 
church.  We  cannot  affirm  that  we  ‘‘believe 
in  the  Holy  Ghost”  as  we  do  in  the  Apostles’ 
Creed  and  at  the  same  time  depreciate  con¬ 
secutive  reflection,  withersoever  it  may  lead 
US.13  \Ye  should  discriminate  between  “fet¬ 
tered  thinking,”  which  many  insist  is  our  duty, 
and  “free  thinking,”  which  is  our  inestimable 
privilege  and  responsibility  as  Protestant  Chris¬ 
tians.  We  need  the  True,  the  Good,  the 
Beautiful,  and  the  Useful.  They  are  all  com¬ 
prised  in  the  Christian  Revelation  of  the  God 
of  love  and  the  love  of  God,  which  does  justice 
to  the  quest  of  the  intelligence  for  Truth,  to 
the  search  of  the  soul  for  the  Good,  to  the 
desire  of  the  emotions  for  the  Beautiful,  and 
to  the  demand  of  the  will  for  the  Useful.  There 
is  no  quarrel  between  science  and  religion, 
between  the  intellect  and  the  heart,  where 
this  highest  synthesis  is  accepted.  The  great¬ 
est  enemy  of  religion  is  not  skepticism  nor 
agnosticism  but  indifference,  as  Sir  Henry 


The  attitude  of  the  minister  to  the  creeds  is  wisely  dis¬ 
cussed  by  Dr.  Merrill  in  The  Freedom  of  the  Preacher,  Chap¬ 
ter  IV  on  “The  Churchman”  (The  Macmillan  Company). 


56 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


Jones  has  so  well  pointed  out  in  his  Gifford 
Lectures  on  A  Faith  that  Enquires}^ 

Nothing  short  of  the  wholeness  of  truth  and 
of  life  could  satisfy  us.  The  habit  of  “think¬ 
ing  in  compartments”  leads  to  partial  views 
and  to  the  perils  of  one-sidedness.  Truth  is  a 
seamless  robe  and  if  we  cut  it  into  fragments, 
to  put  together  as  it  suits  our  tastes,  the  result 
would  be  the  garb  of  a  clown,  a  caricature  of 
the  dignified  dress  of  the  original.  The  prev¬ 
alent  distinction  between  religious  and  secular 
is  misleading,  for  it  implies  a  static  God  rather 
than  the  dynamic  God  of  our  redemption,  who 
is  immanent  and  transcendent,  at  once  within 
our  reach  and  beyond  our  reach,  by  com¬ 
munion  with  whom  our  experience  blossoms 
into  the  perfection  of  blessedness.  This 
distinction  is  responsible  for  much  of  the 
antagonism  between  religion  and  morality. 
Reconciliation  could  be  effected  as  their  domain 
is  widened  and  deepened  to  include  the  whole 
of  life,  in  accordance  vfith  the  idealism  which 
believes  that  all  history  is  sacred,  that  man  is 
not  an  isolated  being  but  related  and  indebted 
to  his  social  world,  and  that  he  exercises  free¬ 
dom  in  pursuing  ends  which  he  may  never 
fully  achieve,  but  which  yet  steadily  advances 

Compare  my  article,  “Thinking  Through,”  in  the  Method¬ 
ist  Review,  November,  1917,  p.  875£f. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  57 


him  toward  the  goal  of  ineffable  bhss.  “A 
thing  that  does  nothing  is  nothing.”  The 
reality  of  our  religion  is  to  be  evidenced  by 
the  behavior  it  inspires  in  respect  of  the  enrich¬ 
ing  of  family  life,  the  elevating  of  social 
activities,  the  bettering  of  economic  conditions, 
the  stabilizing  of  political  relations,  nationally 
and  internationally — all  of  which  are  closely 
concerned  in  the  development  of  character 
and  the  effective  exercise  of  an  opulent  Chris¬ 
tian  influence. 

The  traditional  type  of  Protestantism  failed 
to  coordinate  life  because  its  outlook  was 
parochial.  The  overemphasis  of  individualism 
practically  ignored  the  social  implications  and 
applications  of  religion.  There  has  been  much 
improvement  in  this  respect,  but  the  church  as 
a  whole  still  views  with  suspicion  any  attempts 
toward  the  socializing  of  Christianity.  “The 
diflSculty  with  so  many  congregations  that  are 
living  at  a  poor  dying  rate,  is  that  their  mem¬ 
bers  have  never  been  able  to  form  the  habit 
of  thinking  of  anything  but  themselves.  .  .  . 
It  is  not  that  their  wills  are  perverse  but  that 
their  minds  are  limited.  To  be  sure,  the 
social  engineer  must  follow  the  spiritual  guide 

*  ^  William  Adams  Brown:  The  Church  in  America,  p.  338. 
Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


58 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


and  not  precede  him,  for  a  program  without 
power  to  execute  it  is  only  a  scrap  of  paper. 
On  the  other  hand,  “as  the  torch-bearer  of 
social  idealism”  the  church  should  lead  the 
w^ay  for  the  social  redemption  of  mankind. 
We  must  also  beware  of  the  tendency,  common 
among  social  writers,  to  disparage  philosophy 
and  theology,  both  of  which  are  necessary  to 
prevent  Christianity  from  floundering  in  the 
sands  of  emotionalism.  Philosophy  is  “an 
attitude  of  mind  rather  than  a  doctrine.  It 
is  the  experience  of  the  world  becoming 
reflective  and  endeavoring  to  comprehend  it¬ 
self.”^®  With  a  slight  change  of  terms,  this 
description  equally  holds  good  of  theology. 

We  thus  come  back  to  our  major  contention 
that  the  thinker  is  the  strategic  man.  He  is 
not  the  individual  who  is  lost  in  abstractions 
removed  from  the  vulgar  realities  of  life,  but 
one  who  studies  the  concrete  problems,  to 
know  and  to  understand,  convinced  that  that 
is  the  indispensable  condition  of  doing.  “Action 
separated  from  knowledge  is  not  action;  it  is 
mere  mechanical  movement,  mere  nature,  ab¬ 
stract  and  therefore  not  independently  real.”^^ 

Henry  Jones:  Idealism  as  a  Practical  Creeds  p.  7. 

H.  Wildon  Carr:  The  Philosophy  of  Benedetto  Croce,  p.  141. 
Reprinted  with  permission  of  Macmillan  &  Co.,  Ltd.,  Pub¬ 
lishers,  London. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  59 


‘T  did  it  ignorantly  in  unbelief,”  said  Paul, 
with  reference  to  his  pre-Christian  career. 
He  here  confessed  the  folly  and  futility  of 
misdirection.  How  much  this  is  responsible 
for  the  modern  debacle  needs  no  extensive 
exposition.  No  one  could  read  The  Pomp  of 
Power,  by  Laurance  Lyon,  a  Canadian  barrister, 
and  his  more  recent  book,  When  There  is  No 
Peace,  without  a  blush  of  shame  and  a  feeling 
of  humiliation  that  many  avoidable  blunders 
were  perpetrated  during  the  war  and  since 
the  armistice  because  selfish  and  shortsighted 
men  insisted  on  holding  the  reins  of  authority, 
not  for  the  sake  of  patriotism  but  of  personal 
advantage.  J.  M.  Barrie,  in  his  Rectorial 
Address  on  ‘‘Courage”  at  Saint  Andrews  Uni¬ 
versity,  acknowledged  as  much.  “We  were 
not  meaning  to  deceive;  most  of  us  were  as 
honorable  and  as  ignorant  as  the  youth  them¬ 
selves;  but  that  does  not  acquit  us  of  failings 
such  as  stupidity  and  jealousy,  the  two  black 
spots  in  human  nature  which,  more  than  love 
of  money,  are  at  the  root  of  all  evil.”^^  The 
pages  of  church  history  recite  similar  tragedies. 
When  we  seek  for  an  explanation  of  the  slow 
progress  of  religion  it  must  be  confessed  that 

18 1  Timothy  1.  13. 

1®  Page  8.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  Charles  Scribner’s 
Son,  Publishers,  New  York  City. 


60 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


one  of  the  fertile  causes  of  failure  has  been  the 
refusal  to  follow  the  light,  not  because  of  a 
fear  of  making  ventures  as  of  the  innate  ten¬ 
dency  to  follow  the  old  and  tried  course,  even 
though  they  do  not  carry  far. 

The  fact  that  an  idea  is  ancient  is  not  neces¬ 
sarily  an  argument  in  its  favor.  As  a  result 
of  the  teaching  of  science,  we  have  been  brought 
to  the  conclusion  that  we  are  living  in  a  world 
of  change  and  development.  But  when  we 
endeavor  to  apply  this  principle  to  religion, 
we  are  held  up  by  those  who  insist  that  there 
must  be  no  change,  even  when  it  means  adapta¬ 
tion  to  conditions  for  the  sake  of  greater 
spiritual  effectiveness.  Those  who  hold  to 
Christianity  as  a  static  system  virtually  deny 
the  creative  inspirations  of  the  Holy  Spirit  and 
confuse  creed  with  character.  You  cannot 
read  the  Bible  with  open  mind  and  fail  to  regard 
it  as  the  record  of  man’s  agonizing  search  for 
God.  It  was  a  progressive  movement  of  the 
human  soul  that  made  the  vision  splendid 
clearer  to  those  of  deeper  spiritual  sensitiveness, 
whose  eyes  were  able  to  see,  and  ears  to  hear, 
and  minds  to  understand,  and  hearts  to  receive 
better  than  those  who  had  preceded  them. 
Christianity  is  progressive  in  the  sense  that 
later  stages  complete  the  earlier  stages  of  appre¬ 
hension  and  appropriation,  as  the  New  Testa- 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  61 


ment  itself  amply  demonstrates.  The  concep¬ 
tion  of  Christ  as  the  Messiah  met  the  needs 
of  the  early  days,  but  when  Christianity  came 
into  the  larger  world  outside  Palestine,  and 
confronted  the  philosophical  idea  of  the  Logos, 
a  totally  different  problem  arose.  The  writer 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  realized  the  inadequacy 
of  the  Messianic  terminology  and  restated  the 
eternal  truth  of  Christ  in  terms  of  contemporary 
thinking  and  so  gave  proof  of  the  versatility 
and  adaptability  of  the  gospel  for  new  times 
and  new  occasions. This  freedom  of  the  Spirit 
has  been  exercised  by  Christian  thinkers  in 
successive  generations  with  invariably  happy 
results.  The  modern  Christian  thinker  surely 
cannot  be  denied  a  privilege  that  others  have 
enjoyed,  for  the  glory  of  Christ.  The  vitality 
of  Christianity  during  the  centuries  was  evi¬ 
denced  by  its  ability  to  meet  changing  needs 
in  divers  environments  and  yet  to  maintain 
the  essential  unity  of  the  faith  of  Christ,  the 
Redeemer  of  men  and  the  Lord  of  glory.  We 
thus  have  an  Oriental  and  an  Occidental  Chris¬ 
tianity,  a  Roman,  Greek,  and  Protestant  Chris¬ 
tianity,  the  last  exhibiting  a  variety  of  sectarian 

“  Such  a  statement  does  not,  however,  conflict  with  the  fact 
that  this  writer  owed  more  to  the  Old  Testament  than  to 
Hellenic  thought.  Compare  C.  F.  Birney:  The  Aramaic 
Origin  of  the  Fourth  Gospel. 


m 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


forms.  Nowhere  is  there  uniformity  and  the 
definite  mark  of  its  progressiveness  is  in  its 
spiritual  sublimity  and  magnanimity.  Differ¬ 
ences  of  accent  mattered  little  so  long  as  the 
impelling  motive  was  one  of  intense  devotion 
to  Christ  and  the  life  was  one  of  likeness  to 
him.  So  also  must  it  be  to-day.  “While  at 
first  a  progressive  Christianity  may  seem  to 
plunge  us  into  unsettlement,  the  more  one 
studies  it  the  less  he  would  wish  it  otherwise. 
Who  would  accept  a  snapshot  taken  at  any 
point  on  the  road  of  Christian  development  as 
the  final  and  perfect  form  of  Christianity 
Some  would  have  it  that  we  are  less  religious 
than  our  fathers  because,  forsooth,  we  do  not 
continue  the  religious  practices  that  in  their 
day  were  good  for  them.  This  is  a  hasty  and 
unfair  judgment  of  the  modern  religious  spirit. 
Even  though  it  is  impatient  with  traditional¬ 
ism  and  seems  to  lay  violent  hands  on  the 
Ark  of  God,  according  to  the  oversensitive, 
it  is  nevertheless  imbued  with  a  passion  for 
truth  and  for  the  redemption  of  men  no  whit 
inferior  to  the  religious  spirit  of  any  former  age. 

People  have  been  divided  into  four  classes. 
There  is  the  reactionary  group  which  desires 

2^  H.  E.  Fosdick:  Christianity  and  Progress,  p.  155.  Re¬ 
printed  with  permission  of  Fleming  H.  Revell  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  63 


to  go  back  to  conditions  before  the  war:  they 
are  the  obscurantists  who  hold  that  the  progress 
of  the  world  is  like  the  pendulum  of  a  clock, 
which  swings  back  and  forth,  and  who  do  not 
realize  that  we  must  go  forward  or  perish. 
Then  there  are  the  conservatives,  who  insist 
that  we  should  maintain  the  status  quo,  as 
though  there  were  nothing  better:  these  forget 
that  the  position  they  occupy  was  a  legacy 
left  them  by  those  who  had  advanced  beyond 
the  positions  of  their  own  day,  and  that  faith¬ 
fulness  to  our  trust  requires  us  also  to  advance, 
in  a  similar  spirit  of  loyalty  to  truth.  The 
radicals  go  to  the  other  extreme  of  individual¬ 
ism:  they  would  discard  all  the  achievements  of 
the  past  and  upturn  everything  and  bring  in  a 
brand-new  world  which  exists  only  in  their 
heated  and  excited  imagination.  Finally,  there 
are  the  liberals  who  are  open-minded,  hos¬ 
pitable  to  new  ideas  which  they  first  examine 
in  their  context,  and  whose  value  and  validity 
they  carefully  weigh  before  adopting  or 
adapting  them  to  present  needs.  It  is  needless 
to  say  that  the  hope  of  the  future  is  with  the 
genuine  liberals,  who  are  neither  captiously 
cynical  toward  former  adventures  nor  perilously 
cowardly  in  the  face  of  present  complications, 
but  who  show  the  patience  of  self-control,  the 
generosity  of  tolerance,  the  steadfastness  of 


64 


THE  DYNAmC  MINISTRY 


faith,  as  they  look  for  “more  truth  and  light 
yet  to  break  forth  out  of  his  Holy  Word/’ 
On  these  rests  the  responsibility  to  think  deeply, 
to  investigate  thoroughly,  to  understand  com¬ 
pletely,  to  accept  conscientiously,  to  act  cour¬ 
ageously,  for  the  kingdom  of  our  God  and 
the  glory  that  shall  be. 

Let  us  rejoice  that  “God  gave  us  not  a  spirit 
of  fearfulness;  but  of  power  and  love  and 
discipline.”^^  Fear  is  the  stock  in  trade  of 
the  alarmist;  it  is  hardly  creditable  to  the 
Christian  who  knows  that  the  outcome  is  with 
God  who  shall  reign  for  evermore,  and  who 
therefore  resolves  to  be  a  coworker  with  God 
for  the  accomplishment  of  this  gracious  end. 
In  the  Christian  view  life  is  a  combat,  and 
evil  must  be  overcome  by  those  who  pray  and 
labor  and  so  stir  up  the  gift  in  them.  What 
we  have  received  is  a  boon  and  not  a  bane. 
It  is  a  sound  mind,  to  see  straight  and  far,  and 
right  through  to  the  end,  and  thereby  escape 
the  pitfalls  of  fanaticism,  fatalism,  and  fetich- 
ism.  This  blessing  also  gives  power  which 
means  ability  to  do  things  on  a  large  and  ade¬ 
quate  scale  without  the  perils  of  overbearing 
force.  These  two  are  held  together  by  love 
which  prevents  us  from  going  to  the  extremes 
of  pedantry,  due  to  the  unbalanced  use  of 


a  2  Timothy  1.  7. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  65 


mind,  or  of  tyranny,  due  to  the  unlawful  use 
of  power.  ‘‘The  struggle  between  inheritance 
and  experience”  has  continued  to  our  own  day. 
It  is  for  us  to  recognize  the  issues,  to  realize 
our  responsibility  for  a  new  birth  of  freedom 
in  Christ,  to  line  up  with  those  who  have 
consecrated  themselves  to  the  duty  of  close 
thinking,  and  who  know  that  this  obligation 
cannot  be  excused  on  the  plea  of  plunging 
into  action.  The  longer  we  postpone  the  exact¬ 
ing  effort  to  understand  life  and  to  purify  the 
spirit,  the  more  difficult  would  it  be  to  dis¬ 
charge  the  real  function  of  religion,  which  is 
to  moralize  life  in  accord  with  the  standard  of 
spiritual  excellence  in  Christ  Jesus.  The  only 
absolute  values  are  spiritual.  The  insistent 
advocacy  of  spiritual  claims  preserves  the 
independence  and  integrity  of  the  individual, 
whose  experience  is  transfigured  and  entranced 
as  he  seeks  opportunities  for  the  fulfillment  of 
social  responsibilities.  For  the  life  of  all  is 
involved  in  the  life  of  each  and  the  welfare 
of  each  in  the  well-being  of  all.^^ 

It  is  evident  that  we  do  not  think  in  a 
vacuum  nor  are  our  thoughts  self-created. 
Just  as  the  fires  of  a  furnace  must  be  con¬ 
stantly  fed  in  order  that  the  heating  plant 
may  do  its  work  satisfactorily,  so  the  mind 


^  Compare  Jones:  A  Faith  that  Enquires,  p.  181. 


GC 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


should  be  continually  fertilized  by  study  and 
meditation.  It  might  seem  like  a  counsel  of 
perfection  to  urge  preachers  to  keep  abreast 
of  the  best  thought  when  so  many  are  com¬ 
pelled  to  serve  tables,  to  satisfy  the  modern 
mania  to  make  the  church  a  maid-of-all-work, 
and  to  deflect  the  mission  of  the  minister  from 
that  of  a  preacher  to  a  packhorse.  ‘‘Organized 
Christianity,”  says  Professor  Foakes  Jackson, 
“shows  a  growing  tendency  to  discourage 
thinkers  and  students  and  to  exalt  the  claims 
of  less  inconvenient  Christians  who  will  carry 
on  the  business  of  the  church  and  dull  their 
minds  by  restless  activity. There  are  men 
in  the  ministry  who  realize  the  embarrassment 
of  this  tantalizing  situation  and  who  find 
themselves  caught  between  the  upper  and 
nether  millstones,  exhausted  by  attending  to 
the  routine  duties  of  the  church  and  having 
little  energy  left  to  read  the  big  books,  to 
meditate  on  the  great  themes,  to  receive  the 
lucid  vision  of  the  rulership  and  righteousness 
of  God  in  Christ,  and  to  interpret  it  for  the 
edification  and  encouragement  of  their  con¬ 
gregations.  The  pastor  of  one  of  the  largest 
churches  in  his  Conference  declared  that  he 
had  not  read  a  book  for  six  months.  Another 
with  more  than  a  thousand  members  confessed 


24  The  Hibbert  Journal,  January,  1922,  p.  207. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  67 


that  he  was  at  a  loss  to  know  how  to  present 
living  issues  in  this  great  day.  Another  said 
that  he  often  came  to  Saturday  night  without 
a  clearly  thought-out  message  for  Sunday. 
How  natural,  then,  unconsciously,  to  drift 
into  the  pernicious  habit  of  talking  about 
trivial  things  and  discussing  the  minor  moral¬ 
ities  and  letting  the  larger  questions  go  by  the 
board!  But  such  a  practice  has  its  inevitable 
punitive  effects,  so  that  the  preacher  becomes, 

“A  Sabbath  drawler  of  old  saws, 

Distilled  from  some  worm-cankered  homily.” 

The  need  for  a  re-formation  is  urgent,  and 
there  are  signs  that  a  spiritual  renaissance  is 
on  the  way.  The  watchman  in  the  pulpit 
should  be  the  first  to  see  and  herald  the  dawn. 
In  the  final  analysis,  the  answer  to  the  world’s 
questionings  must  be  given  not  by  the  pro¬ 
fessional  philosophers  and  theologians  who 
speak  a  technical  language  but  by  the  preacher 
who  must  deliver  the  thrilling  message  in  a 
language  ‘‘understanded  of  the  common  people.” 
The  call  to  Jeremiah  was  “to  pluck  up  and  to 
break  down  and  to  destroy  and  to  overthrow, 
to  build  and  to  plant. It  was  to  be  a  de¬ 
structive  and  a  constructive  ministry.  It  is 
needless  to  say  that  such  a  mission  requires 


25  Jeremiah  1.  10. 


68 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


keen  and  intrepid  thinking,  to  guard  the 
preacher  as  well  as  his  people  from  the  misery 
of  muddling  through.  IMuch  of  our  thinking 
has  suffered  from  arrested  development  because 
of  the  vicious  habit  of  seeking  short  cuts  and 
of  the  preoccupation  with  doing.  It  is  impossi¬ 
ble  to  continue  in  such  a  state  of  intellectual 
and  spiritual  stagnation  and  expect  the  king¬ 
dom  of  God  to  come  with  power.  The  call 
is  by  no  means  to  an  easy  task,  nor  would  it 
be  worth  much  if  it  were.  Let  us  at  any  cost 
secure  a  spacious  background  of  strong  and 
sound  thinking,  and  heed  the  counsel  of  the 
alert  apostle:  “Give  diligence  to  present  thyself 
approved  unto  God,  a  workman  that  needeth 
not  to  be  ashamed,  handling  aright  the  word 
of  truth.’’-® 


2  Timothy  2.  15. 


THE  ADVANCING  PROTESTANTISM  69 


SUGGESTED  READING 

Sir  Henry  Jones:  A  Faith  that  Enquires. 

D.  Graham:  Religion  and  Intellect.  A  New 
Critique  of  Theology. 

James  Harvey  Robinson:  The  Mind  in  the  Making. 
The  Relation  of  Intelligence  to  Social  Reform. 

L.  P.  Jacks:  Religious  Perplexities. 

R.  W.  Livingstone,  Editor:  The  Legacy  of  Greece. 

William  E.  Hocking:  The  Meaning  of  God  in 
Human  Experience. 

George  Galloway:  The  Philosophy  of  Religion. 

William  K.  Wright:  A  Students  Philosophy  of 
Religion. 

John  Oman:  Grace  and  Personality . 

Arthur  C.  McGiffert:  The  Rise  of  Modern  Reli¬ 
gious  Ideas. 

James  B.  Pratt:  The  Religious  Consciousness. 

Sir  James  G.  Frazer:  The  Golden  Bough.  One 
Volume  Edition. 

James  Y.  Simpson:  Man  and  the  Attainment  of 
Immortality. 

Francis  G.  McConnell:  Public  Opinion  and 
Theology. 

Ernst  Troeltsch:  Protestantism  and  Progress. 

H.  E.  Fosdick:  Christianity  and  Progress. 

Anglican  Essays.  A  Collective  Review  of  the 
Prineiples  and  Special  Opportunities  of  the  Anglican 
Communion  as  Catholic  and  Reformed. 

Liberal  Evangelicalism:  An  Interpretation.  By 
Members  of  the  Church  of  England. 

Sir  James  Marchant,  Editor:  The  Coming 
Renaissance. 


m 

THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


“Preach  the  word;  be  urgent  in  season,  out  of 
season;  reprove,  rebuke,  exhort,  with  all  longsuffer- 
ing  and  teaching.” — 2  Timothy  2, 

“The  large  majority  of  the  clergy  in  the  periods 
indicated  did  not  aspire  to  be  heard  in  the  great 
congregation,  nor  expect  to  raise  their  voices  on  any 
hall  of  Mars.  They  were  employed  in  obscure 
spheres  far  from  the  crowded  scenes  of  human 
traffic.  Yet  what  a  preferable  lot  was  theirs,  who, 
disdainful  of  material  wealth  and  honors,  devoted 
themselves  to  the  highest  service!  Be  worthy  of 
all  the  glorious  company,  for  whenever  you  enter 
the  pulpit,  you  are  encompassed  about  by  this 
great  cloud  of  witnesses.  They,  the  spiritual  men¬ 
tors  of  the  ages,  taught  their  fellows  that  righteous¬ 
ness  exalts  the  nations  and  Divine  Love  redeems 
the  race,  turning  men  from  the  grossest  degradation 
to  belief  in  God  and  obedience  to  his  commands. 
.  .  .  .  The  deepest  problems  of  earthly  specula¬ 
tion  were  not  more  than  difficult  trifles  in  their 
estimation,  unless  they  led  men  to  Him  in  whom 
is  the  fulfillment  not  only  of  reason  but  of  that 
which  is  forever  beyond  reason — the  Will  of  the 
Everlasting  Father.” — S.  Parkes  Cadman:  Ambassa¬ 
dors  of  God,  p.  89.^ 

^  Reprinted  witli  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


CHAPTER  III 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 

The  pulpit  is  between  two  fires.  One  has 
been  lighted  by  those  who  insist  that  worship 
is  the  important  consideration  and  who  make 
more  of  sacramental  orders  than  of  prophetic 
ordination.  The  other  has  been  kindled  by 
those  whose  zeal  oversteps  knowledge  and  who 
advocate  the  immediacy  of  service,  attracted 
by  the  diversity  of  institutional  activities  more 
than  by  the  intensity  of  inspirational  influence. 
The  former  magnify  the  priest,  the  latter  the 
administrator.  This  new  emphasis  on  worship 
and  work  is  gratifying,  but  it  is  a  mistake  to 
give  preaching  a  subordinate  place,  as  though 
the  churches  were  suffering  from  ‘‘sermon- 
olatry.”  The  ‘^speaking  man,”  as  Carlyle 
described  the  preacher,  has  not  become  obso¬ 
lete,  and  his  supreme  task  cannot  be  set  aside 
in  favor  of  other  forms  of  religious  ministration. 
We  who  hold  the  evangelical  testimony  should 
never  forget  that  the  most  signal  triumphs  of 
Christianity  were  won  by  our  churches  through 

73 


74 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


the  preaching  of  the  Word  and  that  in  its 
wake  have  followed  many  of  the  social  changes 
which  wrought  so  beneficially  for  the  human 
race,  such  as  the  emancipation  of  slavery, 
prison  reform,  and  missionary  work.  When  w^e 
cease  to  exalt  the  pulpit  and  dim  its  light  we 
are  unconsciously  sounding  the  death  knell  of 
militant  Christianity. 

The  present  impasse  of  the  church  will  not 
be  overcome  by  ornate  services  and  multi¬ 
tudinous  service,  but,  rather,  by  the  enlight¬ 
ened  utterances  of  the  pulpit,  which  give 
direction  to  both.  The  church  was  never  more 
busy  than  in  the  days  before  the  war,  but  the 
two  reports  on  The  Army  and  Religion  and 
Religion  Among  American  Men  lead  to  the 
humiliating  conclusion  that  the  church  had 
failed  to  impart  to  its  membership  the  kind 
of  light  and  leading  which  would  have  helped 
them  to  meet  their  besetting  temptations  with 
adequate  spiritual  equipment.  The  confused 
ideas  of  Christianity,  the  crude  notions  of  the 
Bible,  the  provincial  conceptions  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  life,  clearly  proved  that  the  teacher- 
preacher  had  not  been  in  evidence  in  the 
pulpit,  and  that  religious  education  through 
this  and  other  agencies  of  the  church  had 
been  perfunctorily  performed.  Bishop  Pecock, 
who  opposed  the  Lollards,  wisely  remarked 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


75 


that  heresy  was  rife  among  the  laity  because 
of  the  dearth  of  clergy  learned  in  logic,  moral 
philosophy,  and  divinity,  to  expound  the 
Scripture.^  How  true  this  is  in  our  own  day 
of  the  riotous  prevalence  of  poisonous  “isms,” 
which  are  undermining  the  faith  of  the  half- 
educated  and  are  disrupting  the  work  in  so 
many  of  our  churches!  The  solution  is  not 
to  be  obtained  by  multiplying  organizations, 
nor  could  we  escape  the  demands  of  thought 
by  becoming  absorbed  in  a  ceaseless  round  of 
ecclesiastical  “busy -ness.” 

As  throwing  light  on  the  present  situation, 
I  was  greatly  interested  to  read  Some  Qualities 
Associated  with  Success  in  the  Christian  Minis¬ 
try,  by  Dr.  Mary  E.  Moxcey.  This  investiga¬ 
tion  was  based  on  a  study  of  the  Minutes  of 
the  New  York  and  New  York  East  Conferences, 
covering  a  period  of  fifteen  years,  prior  to  and 
including  1916.  The  purpose  was  to  ascertain 
what  really  constituted  ministerial  success, 
from  the  standpoints  of  sermon,  pastoral, 
executive  and  evangelistic  ability,  as  deter¬ 
mined  by  these  records  and  the  judgment  of 
fellow  ministers.  Of  course,  such  a  question¬ 
naire  has  its  limitations  because  it  cannot 
adequately  reckon  with  the  important  factor 

2  H.  O.  Taylor:  Thought  and  Expression  in  the  Sixteenth 
Century,  vol.  ii,  p.  46. 


76 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


of  personality^  the  character  of  the  membership 
and  the  changing  neighborhood  of  the  respec¬ 
tive  local  churches.  These  belong  to  the 
psychological  diagnostician  rather  than  to  the 
expert  statistician,  who  is  strong  in  figuring 
but  weak  in  interpreting.  Statistics  like  the 
Bertillon  measurements  tell  us  only  part  of 
the  truth  and  often  not  the  most  important 
part.  Doctor  Moxcey  acknowledges  as  much 
and  is  aware  of  the  relative  unreliability  of  the 
records.  Even  so,  the  conclusions  of  this 
Columbia  University  thesis  are  suggestive  as 
showing  the  trend  of  the  modern  church,  which 
gives  the  first  place  to  the  executive  who 
“makes  things  go,”  as  a  skillful  administrator 
and  financier.  The  work  of  preaching  is  tacitly 
regarded  as  of  secondary  importance,  and 
while  it  is  profitable  enough,  it  is  not  a  decidedly 
effective  agency.  In  other  words,  the  modem 
church,  according  to  the  findings  of  this  thesis, 
thinks  more  of  managers  than  of  ministers,  of 
promoters  than  of  preachers,  of  advertisers 
than  of  apostles,  of  entertainers  than  of  enlight¬ 
eners,  of  egotists  than  of  altruists,  of  the  man 
with  a  program  than  of  the  man  with  the 
message  of  “love  divine  all  loves  excelling,” 
of  the  life  immersed  in  the  passing  show  than 
of  the  life  which  is  “hid  wnth  Christ  in  God.” 
Well  did  Hankev  remark  in  one  of  his  letters 

C/ 


THE  DISTINCTR^E  PULPIT  T7 

that  the  great  fault  of  the  church  is  irrele¬ 
vance.^ 

This  putting  of  the  cart  before  the  horse 
is  one  of  the  standing  temptations  and  weak¬ 
nesses  of  organizations.  The  fact  that  the 
modern  church  has  practically  surrendered  to 
this  fatal  error  is  one  of  the  alarming  signs  of 
the  times.  If  ministerial  success  is  to  be 
measured  chiefly  by  materialistic  standards, 
the  church  has  surely  fallen  on  evil  days.  We 
need  not,  then,  be  surprised  to  read  a  criticism 
of  the  church  contained  in  an  article  on  “Reli¬ 
gion  in  the  United  States,”  in  The  Century 
Magazine  for  August,  1922.  Here  is  the 
verdict:  “I  find  organized  religion  in  America 
to-day  unstimulating;  I  find  it  intellectually 
dull  and  artistically  barren;  I  find  its  spiritual¬ 
ity  shallow  in  scope  and  impoverished  in 
expression;  but  I  cannot  honestly  say  that  I 
find  it  any  of  these  things  for  the  people  who 
make  up  its  membership.”  Now  listen  to  a 
few  sentences  from  The  Church  in  America,  by 
Professor  William  Adams  Brown,  who  cannot 
be  charged  with  bias  or  petty  captiousness,  and 
whose  book  is  a  comprehensive  discussion  of 
our  perils,  needs,  and  responsibilities:  “Taking 
the  American  Church  as  a  whole,  the  first 

3  Letters  of  Donald  Hankey,  p.  352.  Fleming  H.  Revell 
Company. 


78 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


characteristic  that  strikes  us  as  worthy  of  note 
is  its  provincialism.  By  this  I  mean  the  ten¬ 
dency  of  each  local  congregation  or  group  of 
congregations  to  think  of  itself  as  a  self-sufficient 
whole.  .  .  .  Christian  people  have  been  accus¬ 
tomed  to  think  of  their  churches  as  designed 
to  minister  to  their  own  private  interests  and 
needs  rather  than  as  a  part  of  the  great  spiritual 
enterprise  that  has  for  its  purpose  the  bringing 
in  of  the  kingdom  of  God.”^  That  is  to  say, 
in  this  day  of  the  world’s  greatest  intellectual 
and  social  revolution,  the  church  moves  along 
uninfluenced  by  and  virtually  indifferent  to  the 
precipitous  currents  that  surge  all  around  it, 
perfectly  content  if  it  can  hold  its  own  by 
paying  the  minister  a  miserable  pittance  and 
compelling  him  to  be  a  jack-of-all-trades,  and 
saving  its  face  by  handing  out  a  niggardly 
support  to  missionary  work. 

We  are  making  diligent  inquiries  why  men 
do  not  enter  the  ministry.  Principal  Oman, 
of  Westminster  College,  Cambridge,  recently 
stated  some  of  the  reasons  that  led  men  to 
decide  to  turn  aside  from  their  original  purpose 
to  enter  the  ministry,  after  they  returned  from 
the  war.  ‘‘On  the  general  question  of  service 
they  felt  that  congregations  are  gatherings  of 
dull,  rather  timid,  respectable  people,  tradi- 


4  Pages  72,  196. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


79 


tional  in  their  beliefs  and  negative  in  their 
morality.  They  said  they  had  found  more 
consideration  for  the  publican  and  the  sinner 
and  more  real  effective  brotherhood  in  the  army 
than  they  had  ever  found  in  the  church.”^ 
But  if  the  executive  is  the  man  in  demand, 
and  when  church  officials  anxiously  ask  whether 
the  prospective  minister  is  ‘‘a  good  business 
man,”  as  though  that  were  the  first  considera¬ 
tion,  what  else  could  be  expected  from  men 
with  passionate  idealisms?  Indeed,  the  the¬ 
ological  curriculum  should  be  completely 
altered,  in  these  circumstances,  and  some  of 
the  leading  subjects  taught  in  a  business  col¬ 
lege,  such  as  scientific  management  and  book¬ 
keeping,  should  be  preferred.  If  the  Bible  is 
studied  at  all,  more  attention  should  be  given 
to  the  book  of  Numbers  than  to  the  Gospel 
of  John,  and  to  Leviticus  with  its  ritualistic 
regulations  than  to  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans 
with  its  dynamic  inspirations.  We  should  also 
make  a  different  sort  of  appeal  in  recruiting 
men  for  the  ministry.  Such  an  excellent  book 
like  Bishop  McDowell’s  This  Mind  would  then 
be  only  a  species  of  tantalizing  camouflage. 
Let  us  at  once  call  a  halt  to  this  suicidal  career, 
for  this  way  leads  straight  to  spiritual  desola¬ 
tion.  A  renewed  study  of  the  New  Testament, 

^  The  British  Weekly,  August  31,  1922. 


80 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


in  the  light  of  modern  needs  and  of  the  failures 
and  successes  recorded  in  church  history, 
would  show  us  how  to  avoid  going  from  the 
frying  pan  into  the  fire.  Above  all,  it  would 
challenge  us  to  prepare  for  the  new  leadership 
which  the  church  must  assume,  under  the 
guidance  of  the  preacher,  who  is  the  key-man 
to  the  whole  situation. 

There  is  indeed  no  task  comparable  wdth 
that  of  the  preacher,  as  Silvester  Horne  so 
thrillingly  illustrated  in  his  Yale  Lectures  on 
The  Romance  of  Preaching.  I  mention  him 
because  there  are  many  who  strongly  felt, 
according  to  the  testimonies  contained  in  his 
Life  by  Principal  Selbie,  that  Horne  made  a 
mistake  when  he  went  into  the  House  of  Com¬ 
mons,  in  spite  of  what  he  wrote  on  the  subject 
in  his  book.  Pulpit,  Platform,  and  Parliament. 
Doctor  Dale,  of  Birmingham,  whose  ministry 
so  profoundly  affected  the  public  life  of  Eng¬ 
land  and,  indeed,  of  all  English-speaking  lands, 
acknowledged  in  his  later  years  that  he  might 
have  done  far  better  for  the  kingdom  of  God, 
had  he  given  less  strength  to  municipal  and 
political  work  and  more  to  the  pulpit  and  the 
pastorate.  Doctor  Maclaren  of  Manchester  and 
Doctor  MTiyte  of  Edinburgh  are  two  illustrious 
examples  of  men  who  restricted  themselves, 
but  whose  influence  was  felt  in  spheres  outside 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


81 


their  specific  province.  What  I  mean  is  that 
when  the  preacher  invades  the  realms  of  social 
and  political  problems  he  unwittingly  falls  into 
the  snare  of  dealing  with  panaceas  instead  of 
principles,  and  is  overtaken  by  the  perils  of 
secularization,  which  sap  the  vitality  of  spir¬ 
itualization.  Ardent  sociologist  as  Professor 
Ellwood  is,  he  remarks  that  social  science  as 
such  is  helpless  without  the  dynamic  of  reli¬ 
gion.®  Doctor  McDougall  concludes  that  “Reli¬ 
gion  is  essentially  a  system  of  supernatural 
sanctions  for  social  conduct,  for  conduct  con¬ 
forming  to  the  moral  code  of  society  and 
especially  for  customs  regulating  the  family 
and  the  relation  of  the  sexes,  on  which,  more 
than  on  anything  else,  social  stability  de¬ 
pends.”^  Is  it  not  a  big  enough  task  for  the 
preacher  to  concentrate  on  this  work  of  inter¬ 
preting  the  “supernatural  sanctions”  for  daily 
guidance?  If  we  only  know  it,  we  would  under¬ 
stand  that  the  urgent  call  to-day  is  to  set  in 
the  center  of  life  the  Christian  principles  of 
love  and  good  will,  which  are  preeminently 
competent  to  overcome  the  paralyzing  pagan¬ 
ism  of  exaggerated  individualism,  of  group 
egoism  and  selfishness,  and  of  the  unsocial 

®  Compare  The  Reconstruction  of  Religion,  p.  33ff. 

^  The  Group  Mind,  p.  375.  Reprinted  with  permission  of 
G.  P.  Putnam’s  Sons,  Publishers,  New  York  City. 


82 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


spirit,  which  are  responsible  for  all  our  present 
discords.  There  is  much  truth  in  the  sciences 
of  eugenics  and  euthenics,  concerning  heredity 
and  environment,  but  these  deal  with  life 
largely  from  the  physical  standpoint.  And,  as 
the  Great  Teacher  pointed  out,  the  life  is  more 
than  meat,  for,  “a  man’s  life  consisteth  not 
in  the  abundance  of  the  things  which  he 
possesseth.”^ 

We  must  first  take  into  account  the  spiritual 
renewal  and  reinvigoration  of  the  Christian 
gospel,  which  goes  farther  and  deeper  than 
ethnological  or  humanitarian  proposals.  Here 
is  where  the  work  of  the  preacher  requires 
preeminent  skill  and  energetic  attention. 

Do  not  infer  that  this  is  a  suggestion  to 
limit  the  outlook  of  the  preacher,  whose  con¬ 
cern  should  cover  all  life  and  all  of  life.  I 
have  no  sympathy  with  the  plea  for  the  “simple 
gospel,”  made  by  those  who  have  not  thought 
out  their  position  and  who  represent  an  indi¬ 
vidualistic  type  of  piety,  which,  in  the  last 
analysis,  is  a  species  of  complacent  selfishness. 
Religion  is  not  a  thing  apart  from  life,  and  to 
speak  of  individualistic  Christianity  is  to  utter 
a  contradiction.  It  reminds  one  of  the  caustic 
remark  of  Sir  William  Harcourt,  who,  when 
told  that  Lord  Randolph  Churchill  contem- 


8  Luke  12.  15. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


83 


plated  the  forming  of  a  Center  Party,  replied, 
“Quite  so,  all  center — and  no  circumference.” 
There  are  many  Christians  who  do  not  realize 
how  much  of  moral  dynamite  is  contained  in 
the  teaching  of  Jesus,  and  that  its  social  appli¬ 
cations  are  so  inevitable  because  it  is  informed 
by  and  charged  with  spiritual  energy.  But 
while  the  preacher  does  not  pose  as  an  expert 
in  sociological  and  economic  questions,  he  must 
insist  that  no  adequate  answer  could  be  given 
these,  unless  we  reckon  wdth  Jesus  Christ. 
“The  question  is  not  whether  changes  will 
occur,  but  how  they  will  occur,  under  whose 
aegis  and  superintendence,  by  whose  guidance 
and  direction,  and  how  much  better  the  world 
will  be  when  they  are  here.  Among  all  the 
interests  that  are  vitally  concerned  with  the 
nature  of  these  changes  none  has  more  at  stake 
than  the  Christian  Church  with  her  respon¬ 
sibility  for  the  cure  of  souls.”^  As  the  spokes¬ 
man  of  the  church,  the  preacher  should  say  the 
timely  things  with  spiritual  authority  and  not 
weary  himself  and  his  hearers,  tediously  dealing 
with  questions  that  no  one  is  asking,  as  though 
he  were  trying  to  slay  a  dead  lion.  In  his 
Yale  Lectures  on  The  Prophetic  Ministry  for 
To-day,  Bishop  Williams  refers  to  three  types 
who  stand  in  the  way  of  realizing  a  Christian 


®  Fosdick:  Christianity  and  Progress,  p.  115. 


84 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


civilization.  “One  is  the  blind  individualist, 
the  conventional  Christian,  who  does  not  see 
the  task  at  all.  Another  is  the  pessimist  who 
resorts,  as  pessimists  always  do,  to  the  apoc¬ 
alyptic  and  eschatological.  He  is  the  second 
adventist  or  premillenarian.  He  faces  the 
task  and  gives  it  up.  The  third  is  the  imprac¬ 
ticable  idealist,  the  visionary,  the  man  with 
a  panacea,  who  has  his  owm  plan  of  the  heavenly 
Jerusalem,  the  celestial  ci^dHzation,  with  com¬ 
plete  specifications  down  to  the  last  gold 
brick  in  the  pavement  thereof.  He  keeps  his 
eyes  fixed  on  that  far-off  goal,  that  perfect 
ideal,  and  sees  nothing  between.”^® 

The  preacher  then  is  preeminently  a  prophet 
who  brings  a  revelation  of  God  to  men,  fresh 
and  fructifying,  and  conscious  that  what  he 
is  saying  is  vital  to  others  because  he  has 
experienced  its  \fitality  in  his  own  soul.  He 
is  distinct  from  the  social  critic  who  rouses 
antagonisms  by  his  specious  generalizations, 
and  from  the  social  reformer  who  meets  with 
opposition  because  of  his  random  iconoclasm. 
The  prophet  assuredly  has  never  been  popular 
because  he  is  not  a  purveyor  of  pious  plati¬ 
tudes,  superficial  commonplaces,  and  subtle 
camouflage.  He  does  not  say  Peace,  peace. 

Page  89.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan 
Company,  Publishers,  New  York  City. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


85 


when  there  is  no  peace^  and  he  is  not  given  to 
the  “habit  of  talking  nonsense  solemnly/’  A 
great  deal  that  passes  for  popular  preaching  is 
a  playing  to  the  galleries  of  prejudice  and  ignor¬ 
ance.  The  men  who  influenced  their  times  and 
changed  the  course  of  life  were  invariably 
unpopular  preachers.  They  were  castigated 
by  their  own  generation  and  celebrated  by 
succeeding  generations — a  witness  at  once  to 
the  shortsightedness  and  hastiness  of  our  human 
ways.  Think  of  such  men  as  Chrysostom, 
Savonarola,  Wycliffe,  Huss,  Luther,  Calvin, 
Knox,  Wesley,  Robertson,  Beecher,  Brooks, 
Spurgeon,  Hugh  Price  Hughes.  They  sowed 
the  seed  in  tears  and  later  generations  have 
been  reaping  the  golden  harvests.  None  of 
them  was  popular  in  the  accepted  sense.  Pul¬ 
pit  committees  would  have  passed  them  by  in 
favor  of  the  safe  man  who  has  nothing  to  say 
and  who  says  it,  and  whose  speech  is  “faultily 
faultless,  icily  regular,  splendidly  null.”  This 
means  that  we  need  not  only  a  prophetic 
pulpit  but  also  an  enlightened  pew,  to  cooperate 
in  extending  the  sovereignty  of  God’s  will  of 
righteousness  and  love  throughout  the  world. 

What  is  prophetic  preaching  It  is  that 
which  has  clear-sighted  understanding  of  the 
manifold  gospel  of  redemption,  profound  sanity 
in  interpreting  its  manysided  message,  cour- 


86 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


ageous  ability  and  unlimited  charity  in  apply¬ 
ing  its  versatile  truths  to  discordant  conditions. 
If  insight  is  “a  matter  of  intensity  of  feeling,” 
such  preaching  has  it,  for,  as  Carlyle  well  said, 
‘‘intensity  depends  on  our  patience,  our  firm¬ 
ness,  our  lovingness,  what  strength  soever  we 
have.”  Such  a  preacher  is  a  man  of  his  times, 
who  speaks  to  his  times  the  word  that  suits 
all  times,  although  each  age  must  express  the 
truth  in  terms  appropriate  to  its  own  times. 
The  prophet  thus  moves  among  men,  not  as 
a  cenobite  but  as  a  companion,  and  he  is  in 
deep  sympathy  with  the  varying  aspects  of 
human  nature.  He  is,  furthermore,  skillful 
in  the  art  of  estabhshing  connections  between 
God  and  men,  and  when  he  speaks  it  is  with 
passionate  directness  and  almost  colloquial 
simplicity  of  speech.  Such  a  preacher  retains 
and  extends  his  power  because  he  gives  the 
impression  that  he  does  not  take  counsel  with 
expediency  nor  resort  to  evasions  lest  he 
offend  the  ecclesiastical  elite.  He  rather 
delivers  the  burden  of  the  Lord  without  fear 
or  favor,  for  he  has  felt  it  intensely  in  his  very 
bones,  and,  since  he  has  been  profoundly 
moved  by  it,  he  has  the  certainty  that  his 
hearers  likewise  would  be  moved. 

In  this  respect  the  Hebrew  prophet  and  the 
Christian  preacher  occupy  the  same  platform. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


87 


The  word  that  came  to  Jonah  concerning 
Nineveh  was:  “Preach  imto  it  the  preaching 
that  I  bid  thee”  (3.  ^).  The  mission  of  Isaiah 
was  to  “make  the  heart  of  this  people  fat,  and 
make  their  ears  heavy  and  shut  their  eyes; 
lest  they  see  with  their  eyes,  and  hear  with 
their  ears,  and  understand  with  their  heart, 
and  turn  again,  and  be  healed”  (6.  10).  The 
reference  is  to  the  deadening  of  the  moral 
sensibilities  which  his  preaching  would  pro¬ 
duce,  as  is  suggested  in  the  animated  question, 
“Lord,  how  long?”  Such  an  experience  was 
not  peculiar  to  Isaiah,  for  it  was  common  to 
all  the  prophets.  Indeed,  this  is  one  of  the 
inevitable  results  of  preaching,  as  psychology 
tells.  It  is  a  savor  from  death  unto  death, 
as  often  as  it  is  a  savor  from  life  unto  life,  and 
we  are  sufficient  for  these  things  only  as  we 
realize  that  our  sufficiency  is  from  God.^^  The 
summons  to  Jeremiah  was:  “To  whomsoever 
I  shall  send  thee  thou  shalt  go,  and  whatso¬ 
ever  I  shall  command  thee  thou  shalt  speak,” 
with  the  threat,  “Be  not  dismayed  at  them,  lest 
I  dismay  thee  before  them”  (1.  7,  17).  The 
conviction  of  Amos  was:  “The  lion  hath  roared; 
who  will  not  fear?  The  Lord  Jehovah  hath 
spoken;  who  can  but  prophesy?”  (3.  8).  This 
conviction  expresses  that  of  the  apostle:  “For 


“  Compare  2  Corinthians  2.  14;  3.  6. 


88 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


necessity  is  laid  upon  me;  for  woe  is  unto  me, 
if  I  preach  not  the  gospel.”^^  The  commission 
of  Jesus  to  his  disciples  was:  ‘‘As  the  Father 
hath  sent  me,  even  so  send  I  you/’  Their  mis¬ 
sion  was  expressed  in  the  sentence:  “Y'e  also 
bear  witness,  because  ye  have  been  with  me 
from  the  beginning/’^^  This  applies  to  all 
who  have  the  vivid  spiritual  experience  of  the 
passion,  the  presence  and  the  power  of  Christ, 
without  which  preaching  is  a  blasphemous 
insolence.  The  spirit  of  confidence  and  resolu¬ 
tion  is  the  same  in  both  cases,  but  the  content 
of  the  Christian  preacher’s  message  is  richer 
and  fuller  than  that  of  the  Old-Testament 
preacher,  both  of  whom,  however,  proclaim 
the  destiny  of  those  who  receive  or  reject  the 
truth  of  God.^^ 

Candor  is  one  of  the  first  qualities  of  effective 
preaching.  It  has  its  perils  and  its  compensa¬ 
tions.  Those  who  urge  caution  in  presenting 
unfamiliar  or  unwelcome  aspects  of  truth  are 
unwittingly  advocating  the  cowardly  policy 
of  silence  or  the  unworthy  and  disreputable 
course  of  evasion  for  the  sake  of  a  delusive 


^2 1  Corintliians  9.  16. 

13  John  20.  21;  15.  27. 

1^  Compare  Henry  J.  Pickett:  The  Hebrew  Prophet  and  the 
Modern  Preacher,  for  a  discerning  discussion  of  Christian 
preaching  as  the  prophetic  declaration  of  the  gospel. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


89 


peace.  Others  who  urge  outspokenness  often 
go  to  the  extreme  of  disregarding  prejudices 
which,  even  if  mistaken  for  convictions,  are 
held  with  pious  zeal  by  many  devout  followers 
of  our  Lord,  whose  fidelity  is  often  in  excess 
of  their  intellectuality.  And  yet,  as  one  of  the 
characters  in  Principal  Jacks’  Legends  of 
Smokeover  puts  it:  “Candor  is  a  more  formidable 
antagonist  than  cunning!”  (p.  203).  Dr.  J. 
A.  Hutton  has  forcefully  stressed  the  same 
idea:  ‘Tn  the  long  run  the  church  will  recover 
after  every  crisis  and  will  survive  not  by  any 
display  of  adroitness  or  superficial  resource, 
but  by  the  truth  and  inevitableness  of  her 
spiritual  direction,  and  largely  by  the  candor 
and  conviction  of  her  accredited  exponents.”^^ 
One  reason  for  the  “impenetrable  fog”  in  which 
so  many  men  in  the  army  found  themselves, 
although  they  were  church  members,  was  due 
to  the  fact  that  they  had  received  such  frag¬ 
mentary  and  incoherent  views  of  Christianity. 
One  of  the  army  chaplains  wrote:  “We  have 
not  been  quite  honest  about  the  Bible;  we 
most  of  us  hold  one  theory  and  assent  by  our 
silence  to  our  people  holding  another.”  The 
time  has  surely  come  when  this  sort  of  double- 

^  That  the  Ministry  Be  Not  Blamed,  p.  119.  Reprinted 
with  permission  of  George  H.  Doran  Company,  Publishers, 
New  York  City. 


90 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


dealing  should  cease,  and  the  longer  we  post¬ 
pone  facing  it,  the  more  complicated  will  be 
the  issues.  Doctor  Pringle-Pattison  recently 
sounded  the  note  of  warning,  when  he  declared 
that  many  outside  the  churches,  who  are  in 
sympathy  with  Christian  ideals,  are  ‘‘alienated 
from  official  Christianity  by  the  incredibilities 
which  are  mingled  with  its  teaching.”^®  We 
have  carried  the  doctrine  of  reserve  far  enough, 
and,  unless  we  assume  our  responsibility  now, 
in  the  fear  of  God,  even  though  we  may  find 
ourselves  in  a  hornets’  nest,  the  consequences 
to  the  cause  of  Christianity  will  prove  dis¬ 
astrous.  The  propaganda  of  the  ‘‘Fundamental¬ 
ists”  cannot  be  counteracted  by  direct  argument 
but,  rather,  by  patient  and  sustained  instruc¬ 
tion,  imparted  by  the  pulpit,  in  Bible  classes 
and  in  other  study  groups.  What  is  true  of 
these  vigorous  campaigners  applies  to  pre- 
millennialists,  pentecostalists  and  others  of  a 
like  type,  whose  conceptions  of  the  Bible  are 
frankly  literalistic,  in  common  with  much  that 
is  held  by  the  average  men  and  women  in  our 
pews,  so  that  these  latter  are  easily  stampeded 
by  the  militant  propagandists.  We  are  in 
danger  from  those  who  insist  that  the  Bible 
shall  speak  only  in  accents  familiar  to  our 

The  Duty  of  Candor  in  Religious  Teaching,  p.  91.  Hodder 
and  Stoughton,  Publishers,  London. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


91 


forefathers.  They  fail  to  see  that  the  Bible 
is  a  living  voice,  that  we  should  distinguish 
between  the  letter  that  killeth  and  the 
spirit  that  giveth  life,  and  that  if  we  put  back 
the  clock  the  summer  of  faith  and  joy 
will  pass  into  the  winter  of  doubt  and  dis¬ 
content. 

Courage  is  another  desirable  virtue  in  the 
preacher.  Dean  Inge  has  been  severely  crit¬ 
icized  for  his  fearless  utterances.  After  we 
make  allowance  for  his  questionable  strictures, 
it  must,  however,  be  acknowledged  that  for 
keenness  of  thought,  searching  analysis  and 
incisive  speech,  and  spiritual  intensity  he  is 
without  a  superior.  He  is  the  Carlyle  in  the 
twentieth-century  pulpit,  courageously  exposing 
the  hypocrisy  and  fanaticism  of  popular  reli¬ 
gion,  and  intrepidly  reasserting  the  funda¬ 
mental  veracities  of  the  Everlasting  Yea  in 
an  age  of  mediocrity  and  duplicity,  which 
does  not  believe  in  thoroughness,  because 
success,  so  called,  could  often  be  more  easily 
obtained  by  the  ingenious  device  of  short  cuts. 
Principal  Fairbairn  once  referred  to  the  need 
for  courage  in  the  pulpit,  as  regards  the  choice 
of  subjects  and  the  way  they  should  be  handled. 
‘Tt  may  be  that  want  of  courage  is  only  another 
term  for  want  of  capacity;  but  whichever 
name  be  applied  to  the  defect,  it  is  one  that 


92 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


every  energy  should  be  strained  to  repair  and 
to  remove.  The  potentialities  of  the  pulpit 
are  incalculable;  hardly  any  limit  could  be  set 
to  what  it  might  accomplish.  The  whole  realm 
of  thought  and  feeling,  truth  and  duty,  history 
and  life,  art  and  literature,  knowledge  and 
action  lies  before  it;  crowds  of  anxious,  expec¬ 
tant,  perplexed,  thoughtful  men  and  women 
wait  for  its  words.  The  mysteries  that  most 
appeal  to  the  imagination,  the  history  that 
most  moves  the  heart,  the  hopes  that  most 
uplift,  the  fears  that  most  abase,  the  motives 
that  persuade  the  will,  the  ideals  that  control 
the  conscience  are  at  its  command,  ready  to 
be  used  as  means  to  its  ends  and  instruments 
of  its  power.”  This  is  doubtless  too  high 
and  exacting  a  standard,  but  who  wili  say 
that  anything  lower  is  worthy  of  the  evangel 
and  of  the  evangelist  of  the  unsearchable 
riches  of  God  in  Christ  Jesus  But  courage  is 
much  more  than  outspokenness.  It  is  a  virtue 
that  guards  against  discouragement,  that  keeps 
us  diligently  working  at  our  task  regardless 
of  honors  and  emoluments  associated  with  the 
pomp  and  circumstance  of  the  passing  day, 
that  holds  us  to  the  ideal  of  service  realized 

Religion  in  History  and  in  Modern  Life,  p.  55.  Re¬ 
printed  with  permission  of  George  H.  Doran  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


93 


by  our  Master  and  magnified  by  its  whole¬ 
hearted  acceptance  by  all  valiant  souls  who 
have  given  proof  of  it  in  cheerfulness  and 
buoyancy  and  gaiety  of  spirit.  The  remem¬ 
brance  of  such  is  a  perpetual  benediction 
because  of  what  they  VTOught,  in  the  strength 
of  the  eternal  fellowship.  It  was  Doctor 
Johnson  who  said  of  courage,  “Unless  a  man 
has  that  virtue  he  has  no  security  for  preserving 
any  other.”  How  very  true  of  the  man  who 
stands  in  the  pulpit,  who  must  know  courage 
as  a  vital  experience,  so  that  its  atmosphere 
of  serenity,  geniality,  benignity,  and  liberty 
might  be  received  by  those  in  the  pew,  to  the 
joy  and  rejoicing  of  their  lives. 

Let  us  also  magnify  confidence  as  part  of 
the  preacher’s  equipment.  Our  modern  life  is 
far  too  subjective,  and  we  are  inclined  to  in¬ 
dulge  in  pessimistic  introspection,  as  though  a 
morbid  spirit  were  the  hall  mark  of  piety. 
The  air  is  full  of  hysteria;  hasty  thinking  and 
rash  speaking  are  common;  an  epidemic  of 
mental  confusion  and  religious  fanaticism  is 
laying  low  many  a  hopeful  soul  who  has  not 
found  the  right  spiritual  anchorage.  But  there 
is  no  reason  for  panic,  and  those  who  talk 
recklessly  are  letting  their  tongues  run  away 
with  their  brains.  We  may  be  hemmed  in  on 
all  sides  but  the  sky  is  our  limit. 


94 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


“God’s  greatness 

Flows  around  oui*  incompleteness. 

Round  our  restlessness  his  rest.” 

The  gospel  has  potentialities  yet  to  be  dis¬ 
covered.  When  we  try  to  discount  the  sub¬ 
lime  heights  of  attainment  reached  by  New 
Testament  worthies  and  by  those  in  later 
ages  who  caught  their  secret,  we  only  betray 
our  poverty  of  spiritual  resource.  What  we 
mistakenly  conclude  to  be  figures  of  speech 
in  the  rapturous  language  of  saints  were  actual 
experiences.  Such  works  of  Christ  are  still 
repeated  on  the  mission  field,  where  all  is 
virgin  soil.  Recall  the  testimonies  of  Sadhu 
Sundar  Singh  in  India,  of  Pastor  Tsi  in  China, 
of  Tokichi  Ishii  the  converted  criminal  in 
Japan,  and  you  are  constrained  to  declare  that 
Jesus  is  still  able  to  save  unto  the  uttermost 
all  who  come  unto  God  through  him.  ‘‘New 
times  demand  new  measures  and  new  men.” 
Surely,  but  they  must  be  inspired  by  the  ever 
old  and  ever  new  Spirit  of  God,  which  is  the 
puissant  Spirit  of  Christ,  who  is  the  world’s 
eternal  Contemporary,  and  who  holds  in  his 
blessed  keeping  the  secret  of  eternal  redemp¬ 
tion.  The  religion  of  humanity  is  not  the 
Positivism  of  Comte  but  the  positive  Chris¬ 
tianity  that  accepts  the  leadership  of  Christ, 
and  acknowledges  such  a  consecrated  disciple- 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


95 


ship  that  trusts  the  Teacher,  who  proclaims  a 
personal  God,  a  personal  immortality,  and  an 
individual  and  social  salvation.  Let  the  spirit 
of  our  preaching  have  the  assurance  which  says : 

j“What  we  have  felt  and  seen, 

With  confidence  we  tell.” 

Far  too  much  of  our  preaching  is  of  the 
suburban  type.  We  dwell  on  the  incidentals 
of  the  gospel  more  than  on  its  essentials. 
It  is  an  echo  of  newspaper  headlines  on  sensa¬ 
tional  topics,  whose  vulgarities  and  crudities 
give  pain  to  the  sensitive  and  the  devout  and 
cause  the  thoughtful  to  sneer,  without  doing 
a  particle  of  good  to  those  who  are  “fed-up” 
on  the  movies  and  jazz,  w’hom  such  preaching 
presumably  proposes  to  attract.  It  is  one 
thing  to  secure  an  attendance  but  a  totally 
different  thing  to  compel  attention.  This 
latter  is  the  sublime  task  of  the  preacher,  who 
is  an  agonizer  more  than  an  organizer.  If  he 
knows  anything  at  all,  he  knows  that  the 
Bible  represents  preaching  as  a  strife  between 
the  preacher  on  the  one  side,  and  the  habits 
of  the  people  which  weaken  or  strengthen  their 
will  on  the  other.  It  is  not  novel  themes  but 
great  themes  that  should  engage  our  considera¬ 
tion,  as  was  the  case  with  Newman,  Church, 
Maclaren,  Dale,  Brooks,  Beecher,  Matthew 


96 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


Simpson,  Scott  Holland.  In  pressing  this 
point.  Dr.  George  Jackson  quotes  a  pungent 
criticism  by  Dr.  Joseph  Parker,  who  once 
observed  to  a  famous  brother  preacher  in  his 
frank  and  friendly  way:  “You  can’t  preach 
except  on  the  anecdotes  of  the  Bible.  But 
there’s  a  great  deal  in  the  Bible  besides  anec¬ 
dotes.  When  Spurgeon  first  came  to  London 
he  took  for  his  text,  ‘He  hath  made  us  accepted 
in  the  Beloved.’  Now,  you  wouldn’t  know 
what  to  make  of  a  text  like  that.”^^  Rather 
blunt  but  quite  to  the  point.  We  might  have 
said  it  differently,  but  let  this  putting  of  the 
case  stand.  When  we  hear  it  said  that  people 
are  not  interested  in  preaching,  first  inquire 
whether  the  pulpit  is  an  echo  or  a  voice.  Not 
less  preaching  but  better  is  what  is  needed. 
So  long  as  the  heart  of  man  is  what  it  is,  so 
long  as  the  gospel  retains  its  pristine  glory  and 
its  vanquishing  power,  the  preacher  with  the 
disciplined  mind,  the  full  heart,  the  burning 
conviction,  the  passionate  zeal,  the  speaking 
ability,  cannot  fail  to  exercise  the  healing 
ministry  through  the  pulpit,  as  he  constrain- 
ingly  commends  the  sublime  verities  and 
spiritual  realities  in  Christ  Jesus. 

This  is  an  age  of  theological  imsettlement. 
So  much  greater  is  the  opportunity  of  the 


Reasonable  Religion,  p.  22.  The  Pilgrim  Press,  Boston. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


97 


man  who  has  thought  out  his  message  and 
who  has  received  the  vision.  The  demand  for 
intense  study  is  most  urgent.  Let  it  be  here 
observed  that  the  range  of  topics  should  be 
such  as  shall  meet  the  demands  of  the  pulpit 
and  the  demands  made  on  the  pulpit.  The 
preacher  cannot  be  a  mere  individualist,  for 
he  is  the  representative  of  the  church.  The 
scope  of  his  study  should  therefore  be  deter¬ 
mined  less  b5^  his  personal  interests  and  more 
by  his  responsibility,  under  God,  to  proclaim 
all  of  the  divine  counsel  with  the  authority 
of  assured  knowledge  and  of  a  full  compre¬ 
hension  of  the  diversified  thoughts  and  ques¬ 
tionings  of  his  hearers,  be  they  learned  or 
otherwise.  To  be  sure,  there  are  difficulties 
in  the  way  on  account  of  the  multitudinous 
activities  that  encroach  upon  our  time  and 
energj\  But  here  is  the  situation.  If  the 
preacher  fails  in  the  pulpit,  who  will  make  up 
for  the  loss.^  If  the  hungry  sheep  look  up  and 
are  not  fed  by  their  own  shepherd,  who  will 
do  it?  If  minds  are  perplexed  and  hearts 
troubled  and  lives  biased  in  the  pew,  and  the 
work  of  illuminating  and  encouraging  and 
directing  is  not  done  by  the  pulpit,  where 
could  these  confused  ones  go  for  guidance.^ 
Listen  to  a  layman:  “With  rare  exceptions 
our  pulpits  are  so  incoherent,  so  devoid  of  any 


98 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


great  unifying  purpose  or  scientific  plan.  To 
try  to  gather  equipment  for  some  virile  Chris¬ 
tian  conduct  from  the  sermons  one  hears  is 
like  seeking  an  education  from  the  pages  of 
Tit-Bits.”  Do  not,  however,  mistake  this  as 
a  demand  for  “overemphasis  upon  the  intel¬ 
lectual  side.”  The  call  is  for  trained  and  in¬ 
formed  men,  who  would  not,  by  their  much 
learning  neutralize  or  nullify  their  spiritual 
influence  but  would,  rather,  enhance  and 
magnify  it.  It  is  an  unwarranted  assumption, 
said  Silvester  Horne,  “that  prophetic  power  in 
the  pulpit  especially  attaches  to  the  preacher 
whose  heart  is  full  and  whose  head  is 
empty.” 

What  we  most  imperatively  need  is  to 
recover  the  teaching  function  of  the  pulpit, 
for  “teaching  is  the  basis  of  all  good  preach¬ 
ing,”  as  the  means  of  enlightening  and  educating 
the  private  and  public  conscience.  The 
teacher  here  contemplated  is  not  the  dry-as- 
dust  theologian  or  the  self-absorbed  pedant, 
with  a  dialect  that  necessitates  the  use  of  a 


Compare  my  article  on  “Pastoral  Scholarship”  in  the 
Methodist  Review,  January,  1919,  p.  36. 

2°  Compare  Pepper:  A  Voice  from  the  Crowd,  Lecture  IV, 
on  “Revelation  through  Teaching.”  Reprinted  with  per¬ 
mission  of  Yale  University  Press,  New  Haven,  Connecticut. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


99 


dictionary  in  the  pew.  He  is  one  who  has 
experienced  “the  tenderness  and  healing  powxr 
of  truth”;  who  has  mastered  the  wealth  of 
ideas,  new  and  old,  that  touch  on  the  complex 
conditions  of  life;  who  has  a  feeling  mind,  a 
thinking  heart,  a  moving  outlook,  a  spirit  at 
leisure,  always  hastening  but  never  hurrying; 
who  is  so  intellectually  keen  that  he  discrim¬ 
inates  accurately,  who  is  so  emotionally  sensi¬ 
tive  that  he  sympathizes  impartially,  who  is 
so  spiritually  alert  that  he  produces  faith 
creatively,  who  is  so  completely  consecrated 
to  Christ  that  his  preaching  is  an  assertion 
and  a  manifestation  of  the  mind,  the  motive, 
the  mercy,  the  majesty  and  the  might  of  the 
Son  of  God,  in  whom  “dwelleth  all  the  full¬ 
ness  of  the  Godhead  bodily.” 

Sir  William  Robertson  Nicoll,  in  his  volume 
on  Princes  of  the  Church  introduces  us  to  thirty- 
four  men  eminent  in  British  Christianity. 
He  quotes  with  approval  a  saying  of  Principal 
Edwards  that,  “a  great  preacher  is  Christ’s 
last  resource,”  and  another  from  Principal 
Marcus  Dods,  that  “there  is  something  about 
preaching  that  keeps  life  sweet.”  Criticism 
has  often  turned  out  to  be  a  compliment 
offered  by  the  opponents  of  the  seers  and 
saints,  whose  vision  and  virtue  they  could  not 
understand.  Do  not  disregard  these  animad- 


100 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


versions,  for,  as  we  read  between  their  lines, 
we  might  see  that  their  expectations  are  not 
always  without  justification.  It  may,  after 
all,  be  one  of  the  providential  ways  of  leading 
us  out  into  a  larger  place  of  greater  influence. 
The  task  of  the  preacher  has  never  been  easy, 
but  in  his  struggle  against  odds  he  has  hitherto 
overcome  by  the  creative  faculty,  inspired  of 
the  Divine  Spirit,  whereby  he  has  interpreted 
truth  with  deep  feeling  and  searching  expres¬ 
siveness.  He  is  like  the  painter  who  sees  and 
helps  others  to  see  what  they  ‘‘only  feel  and 
catch  a  glimpse  of  but  do  not  see.”  The  fact 
that  they  have  the  capacity  to  see  is  the  ground 
of  our  attempting  to  direct  and  develop  it, 
so  that  the  vision  splendid  shall  shine  upon 
their  pathway  and  lead  them  into  the 
ineffable  fellowship  of  that  perfect  light  in 
which  is  no  darkness  at  all.  Our  business  is 
not  to  come  down  to  the  level  of  the  world 
but  to  lift  the  world  up  to  God  in  Christ,  not 
by  secular  compromises  but  by  spiritual  con¬ 
straints.  To  be  sure,  we  do  not  all  have  the 
creative  genius  of  those  deservedly  called 
masters,  but  such  should  ever  be  our  ideal, 
and  no  ideal  ever  becomes  obsolete  until  it  is 
realized. 

Preachers  should  take  no  odds  from  anyone 
nor  permit  themselves  to  be  ousted  from  their 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


101 


anchorage  in  Jesus  Christ.  He  has  called  us 
to  this  ministry,  nor  has  he  failed  any  who 
trust  him.  In  spite  of  perils  and  privations, 
of  delusions  and  disabilities,  of  struggles  and 
sacrifices,  we  have  compensations  which  hearten 
us  to  continue  in  our  adventures  and  achieve¬ 
ments.  The  future  is  with  the  preacher  be¬ 
cause  the  future  is  with  Christ.  The  states¬ 
man,  the  editor,  the  scholar,  the  author,  the 
business  man,  the  scientist  are  all  necessary’*, 
but  the  revival  which  must  soon  spread  its 
redeeming  and  purifying  fires  over  the  world 
will  come,  please  God,  through  the  prophetic 
preacher  of  the  Christian  gospel.  With 
thoughts  of  God  made  larger  by  the  facts  of 
evolutionary  struggle  toward  perfection;  with 
conceptions  of  Christ  made  more  luminous  by 
the  study  of  comparative  religion  in  its  effects 
on  life;  with  the  experience  of  the  indwelling 
Spirit  made  richer  by  the  testimony  of  the 
spiritual  elite  of  every  age  and  nation;  with 
the  outlook  of  humanity  made  more  serenely 
comprehensive  by  the  impact  of  races  on  the 
fields  of  commerce,  ci\dlization,  and  war;  with 
the  task  of  the  church  made  more  magisterial 
by  her  activities  in  social  and  civic  righteous¬ 
ness,  by  the  liberation  of  spiritual  energies  and 
by  the  achievements  of  foreign  missions,  the 
message  of  the  preacher  should  now  sound  the 


102 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


trumpet  tones  of  the  supreme  Evangel  to 
earth’s  remotest  bounds,  so  that  all  flesh  shall 
hear  and  come  to  the  only  Source  of  pardon, 
purity,  power,  and  peace,  to  whom  be  glory 
for  evermore. 


THE  DISTINCTIVE  PULPIT 


103 


SUGGESTED  READING 

A.  History  and  Theory  of  Preaching 

S.  Parkes  Cadman:  Ambassadors  of  God. 

Alfred  E.  Garvie:  The  Christian  Preacher. 

John  A.  Hutton :  That  the  Ministry  Be  Not  Blamed. 
Charles  R.  Brown:  The  Art  of  Preaching. 

William  F.  McDowell:  Good  Ministers  of  Jesus 
Christ. 

Paul  B.  Bull:  Preaching  and  Sermon  Construction. 
C.  Silvester  Horne:  The  Romance  of  Preaching. 
James  Stalker:  The  Preacher  and  His  Models. 

J.  H.  Jowett:  The  Preacher  His  Life  and  Work. 
Arthur  S.  Hoyt:  Vital  Elements  of  Preaching. 
Albert  P.  Fitch:  Preaching  and  Paganism. 

Edwin  C.  Dargan:  The  Art  of  Preaching  in  the 
Light  of  Its  History. 

Charles  S.  Gardner:  Psychology  and  Preaching. 
H.  J.  Pickett:  The  Hebrew  Prophet  and  the  Modern 
Preacher. 

Charles  D.  Williams:  The  Prophetic  Ministry  for 
Today. 

Francis  J.  McConnell:  The  Preacher  and  the 
People. 

George  Jackson:  The  Preacher  and  the  Modern 
Mind. 

R.  C.  Gillie:  The  Minister  in  the  Modern  World. 

B.  Recent  Sermons 

John  Oman:  The  Paradox  of  the  World. 

W.  P.  Paterson:  In  the  Day  of  the  Ordeal. 


^  For  other  books,  see  p.  133. 


104 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


W.  M.  MacGregor:  Repentance  unto  Life. 

F.  G.  Peabody:  Sundays  in  College  Chapels  Since 
the  War. 

James  Reid:  The  Victory  of  God. 

W.  L.  Watkinson:  The  Shepherd  of  the  Sea. 
Alexander  Whyte:  Lord,  Teach  Vs  to  Pray. 

J.  H.  Jowett:  God  Our  Contemporary. 

Hubert  L.  Simpson:  Altars  of  Earth. 

J.  D.  Jones:  The  Gospel  of  the  Sovereignty. 

M.  J.  MacLeod:  What  God  Hath  Joined  Together. 
Sidney  M.  Berry:  Revealing  Light. 

John  A.  Hutton:  The  Victory  Over  Victory. 

M.  S.  Rice:  Dust  and  Destiny. 

J.  M.  M.  Gray:  The  Contemporary  Christ. 

William  A.  Quayle:  The  Healing  Shadow. 

W.  M.  Clow:  The  Evangel  of  the  Strait  Gate. 

Henry  Sloane  Coffin:  University  Sermons. 

G.  A.  Studdert  Kennedy:  I  Believe.  Sermons  on 
the  Apostles*  Creed. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE 


“Take  heed  unto  yourselves,  and  to  all  the  flock, 
in  which  the  Holy  Spirit  hath  made  you  bishops, 
to  feed  the  church  of  the  Lord  which  he  purchased 
with  his  own  blood.” — Acts  20.  28. 

“What,  then,  shall  be  our  sovereign  purpose  in 
moving  among  men  in  common  affairs?  It  will 
surely  be  to  relate  the  common  to  the  divine,  and 
to  bring  the  vision  of  the  sanctuary  into  the  street 
and  the  market  and  the  home.  We  are  to  go  among 
men  helping  them  to  see  the  halo  on  the  common¬ 
place,  to  discern  the  sacred  fire  in  the  familiar 
bush.  In  the  sanctuary  men  are  frequently  con¬ 
scious  of  the  stirrings  of  a  heavenly  air,  but  they 
lose  its  inspirations  in  the  streets.  In  the  sanctuary 
they  often  catch  the  gleam  of  the  ideal,  and  they 
often  feel  the  sacred  presence  of  the  Lord  in  the 
ways  of  public  prayer  and  praise,  but  the  gleam 
fades  away  when  they  touch  their  daily  work,  and 
the  Sacred  Presence  is  lost  in  the  crowded  roads 
of  business.  It  must  be  our  ministry  to  help  them 
to  recover  their  lost  inheritance,  and  to  retain  the 
sense  of  heavenly  fellowship  while  they  earn  their 
daily  bread.  We  do  a  mighty  work  when  we  keep 
a  man’s  sense  of  God  alive  amid  all  the  hardening 
benumbments  of  the  world.” — J.  H.  Jowett:  The 
Preacher,  His  Life  and  Work,  p.  193.^ 

^  Reprinted  with  permission  of  George  H.  Doran  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


CHAPTER  IV 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE 

It  is  a  liberal  education  to  be  in  the  com¬ 
pany  of  great  souls  and  to  learn  about  their 
dominating  motives  and  noteworthy  achieve¬ 
ments.  Such  persons  are  not  often  given  to 
talking  about  themselves  except  to  intimate 
friends.  Even  the  expert  interviewer  seldom 
gets  behind  the  veil.  Much  of  this  restraint 
is  removed  in  a  biography.  Its  character  is 
as  varied  as  the  types  and  temperaments  of 
individuals.  The  test  of  a  good  biography  is 
its  ability  to  portray  a  life  so  that  we  under¬ 
stand  both  the  subject  and  his  contemporary 
associations.  The  reading  of  biography  is, 
furthermore,  an  inspiration  in  giving  us  large 
views  and  suggesting  the  lessons  of  failure  and 
of  success.  George  Eliot  once  remarked,  ‘Tt 
is  the  only  thing  worth  reading.”  Biography 
has  always  been  popular  and  the  recent  appear¬ 
ance  of  a  large  number  of  memoirs,  auto¬ 
biographies,  and  reminiscences  proves  that  the 
interest  is  unabated  and  that  we  still  have  an 
insatiable  thirst  for  facts  about  people. 

107 


108 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


But  it  is  invariably  only  the  lives  of  men 
and  women  of  eminence  that  furnish  material 
for  the  art  of  the  biographer.  This  is  equally 
true  of  the  leaders  of  the  church,  who  have 
occupied  conspicuous  positions  and  whose 
careers,  therefore,  seem  to  merit  biographical 
recognition.  And  yet  the  larger  part  of  the 
church’s  work  has  always  been  done  by  men 
in  obscure  parishes,  whose  names  seldom 
appear  in  the  religious  press,  and  whose  influ¬ 
ence  rarely  extends  outside  the  boundaries  of 
their  restricted  fields  of  labor.  Some  of  these 
unknown  servants  of  God  have,  however,  per¬ 
formed  rich  exploits.  The  name  of  Spurgeon 
is  famous,  but  what  about  the  local  preacher 
who  pointed  Christ  to  him.^  The  scholarly 
William  Pirie  Smith,  minister  of  the  Keig  Free 
Church  for  thirty-five  years,  would  never 
have  been  heard  of  outside  of  his  presbytery 
except  for  the  fact  that  he  was  the  father  of 
William  Robertson  Smith,  one  of  the  luminous 
lights  of  biblical  learning.  Sir  William  Robert¬ 
son  Nicoll,  in  his  book  My  Father,  pays  a 
worthy  tribute  to  Harry  Nicoll,  who  labored 
without  fame  in  the  parish  of  Auchindoir: 
‘Tt  will  be  observed  that  all  the  honor  he  ever 
received  was  from  his  own  people.  He  dwelt 
among  them  all  his  life  and  was  schoolmaster 
and  minister  in  their  midst  for  two  genera- 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE 


109 


tions.  .  .  .  He  knew  every  house,  every  indi¬ 
vidual — it  might  be  almost  said  every  tree, 
every  flower,  every  stone  of  the  ‘primitive, 
russet,  remote  country’  in  which  he  lived  and 
died”  (p.  17).  The  manses  in  which  Robertson 
Smith  and  Robertson  Nicoll  spent  their  youth 
were  very  unpretentious  buildings,  without 
conveniences,  but  the  inspiration  they  received 
was  not  from  the  material  structures  but  from 
the  spiritual  and  intellectual  inspiration  within. 
Thomas  Carlyle  speaks  in  terms  of  the  highest 
honor  of  the  Seceder  clergy  of  his  childhood. 
“Most  flgures  of  them  in  my  time  were  hoary, 
old  men;  men  so  like  evangelists  in  modem 
vesture  and  poor  scholars  and  gentlemen  of 
Christ.  .  .  .  That  poor  temple  of  my  childhood 
is  more  sacred  to  me  than  the  biggest  cathedral 
then  extant  could  have  been;  rude,  rustic,  bare, 
no  temple  in  the  world  was  more  so;  but  there 
were  sacred  lambencies,  tongues  of  authentic 
flame,  which  kindled  what  was  best  in  me, 
what  has  not  yet  gone  out.”  Toward  the  close 
of  his  life,  Struthers  wrote  to  an  old  School 
Friend:  “I  have  had  a  very  undistinguished 
life,  though  there  has  been  much  happiness 
in  it.  I  have  worked — I  hope  I  can  say  ‘worked’ 
in  some  measure  truly — quietly  away,  but  I 
have  wrought  no  deliverance  in  the  earth.” 
This  was  a  modest  estimate  of  himself  by  a 


110 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


man  who  had  served  a  small  church  of  the 
Cameronians  in  Greenock  for  thirty-five  years, 
in  spite  of  many  alluring  offers  to  larger  fields. 
In  the  Life  and  Letters  of  John  Paterson 
Struthers  we  have  a  revealing  record  of  pas¬ 
toral  devotion,  and  evidences  of  compensations 
far  beyond  the  material  calculations  of  time 
service.  Dan  Crawford,  author  of  Thinking 
Blacky  has  dedicated  his  new  book.  Back  to 
the  Long  Grass,  as  follows:  ‘‘The  Book  I  had 
hoped  to  place  in  his  hands  I  can  only  dedicate 
to  the  deathless  memory  of  Struthers  of 
Greenock.’’  Better  testimony  than  this  we 
need  not  have. 

These  few  names  represent  a  multitude  of 
men  who  spent  their  strength  in  the  Christian 
ministry,  as  George  Santayana  puts  it,  think¬ 
ing  more  of  winning  the  prizes  of  life  than  of 
snatching  them,  and  who  did  not  abdicate  the 
sovereignty  of  the  inner  man,  as  those  have 
done  who  thus  miss  delight,  dignity,  and  peace 
and  really  lose  the  prize  of  life.^  The  work 
of  such  heroes  affords  us  much  food  for  thought 
in  these  days  which  discount  the  value  of 
unadvertised  service.  “Success”  is  a  relative 
term.  Many  who  are  adjudged  failures  have 
nevertheless  exercised  a  most  prolific  influence 
of  beneficence.  They  worked  for  eternity  and 


2  Compare  Soliloquies  in  England  and  Later  Soliloquies,  p.  37. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE 


111 


saw  the  reward  afar  off,  but  they  were  satis¬ 
fied  in  the  possession  of  a  meek  and  quiet 
spirit,  which  in  the  sight  of  God  is  of  great 
price.  ‘‘Success  has  become  a  somew’hat  odious 
onion  nowadays,  chiefly  because  we  often  give 
the  name  to  the  wrong  thing.”  So  said  Barrie 
in  his  Rectorial  address  on  “Courage”  at 
Saint  Andrews  University.  We  might  think  of 
such  an  attitude  as  that  of  Struthers,  concen¬ 
trating  his  great  talents  in  a  small  field,  as  a 
species  of  idealism,  and  even  lose  our  patience 
with  the  like  of  him.  After  reading  his  life 
there  is  only  one  conclusion,  which  is  that  he 
was  wise.  In  these  matters  each  man  must 
decide  for  himself,  and  be  sure  that  he  does 
not  lose  the  vision  which  beckoned  him  in  the 
morn  of  life  to  undertake  the  ministry  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

Dante  referred  to  the  middle  circle  in  the 
Purgatorio  as  full  of  danger.  He  was  thinking 
of  the  subtle  perils  of  middle  age,  when  so 
many  ministers  reach  the  dead  line,  largely 
owing  to  being  caught  in  the  whirling  under¬ 
currents  of  disillusion  and  self-disparagement. 
The  greatest  wreckage  of  ideals  and  of  char¬ 
acter  takes  place  between  forty-five  and  sixty- 
five  years  of  age.  Dr.  Stanley  Hall,  however, 
sets  forth  the  case  in  a  different  light.  “At 
forty  old  age  is  in  its  infancy,  the  fifties  are 


112 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


its  boyhood,  the  sixties  its  youth,  and  at  seventy 
it  attains  its  majority.  .  .  .  Modern  man  was 
not  meant  to  do  his  best  work  before  forty, 
but  is  by  nature,  and  is  becoming  more  and 
more  so,  an  afternoon  worker.  The  coming 
superman  will  begin,  not  end,  his  real  activity 
with  the  advent  of  the  fourth  decade.”^  This 
thesis  is  maintained  with  a  wealth  of  illustra¬ 
tion  that  has  no  element  of  special  pleading, 
although  the  author  is  over  seventy-five  years 
of  age.  Recall  that  Modern  Democracies  was 
written  by  Viscount  Bryce  when  he  was  eighty- 
two  years,  and.  What  Christianity  Means  to 
Me  by  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott  at  the  age  of  eighty- 
five.  These  three,  volumes  show  clear  vision 
and  a  masterly  grasp  of  the  problems  discussed. 
In  view  of  these  facts,  we  might  well  conclude 
that,  from  the  standpoint  of  youth,  it  is  better 
farther  on. 

Why,  then,  has  middle  age  become  the 
period  of  disenchantment  to  men  in  the  pas¬ 
torate?  As  he  nears  fifty,  the  minister  who 
began  with  holy  enthusiasms  and  ardent 
expectations,  and  whose  career  has  been 
checkered  by  disappointments,  awakes  to  the 
depressing  fact  that  he  has  been  neglected, 

®  Senescence.  The  Last  Half  of  Life,  p.  29.  Reprinted 
with  permission  of  D.  Appleton  &  Company,  Publishers, 
New  York  City, 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  113 


and  that  in  all  probability  his  work  will  have 
to  be  done  in  the  smaller  churches.  If  he 
yields  to  the  pressure  of  despondency,  he  is 
a  lost  man,  and  the  future  of  his  days  will  be 
spent  in  shallows  and  in  miseries.  Is  it  con¬ 
ceivable  that  the  man  of  God  should  surrender 
to  such  a  sinister  conclusion?  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  he  faces  this  crisis  with  courage,  and 
rededicates  himself  to  the  Christ  of  God,  he 
will  renew  his  strength  and  discover  new 
interests  and  make  new  alliances,  which  shall 
bring  back  to  him  the  resilience  of  youth  with¬ 
out  its  illusions,  the  confidence  of  early  days 
without  its  uncertainty,  the  buoyancy  of  the 
mom  without  its  recklessness.  In  this  per¬ 
spective  of  experience  he  would  come  to  a 
better  understanding  of  real  values  and  know 
how  to  stress  the  things  that  belong  to  peace. 
What  is  more  important,  he  would  overcome 
the  paralysis  of  doubt  by  the  energy  of  faith; 
he  would  counteract  the  insidious  poison  of 
cynicism  with  the  assurance  that  the  ideal 
can  never  become  obsolete  until  it  is  realized; 
he  would  give  the  lie  to  sour  discontent  by  the 
experiences  in  the  secret  of  the  Presence,  where 
the  heart  is  fixed  trusting  in  God.  Such  a  man 
can  never  be  defeated,  nor  his  soul  soiled, 
nor  his  spirit  stained.  The  light  that  shone 
upon  him  at  the  beginning  of  his  ministry  will 


114 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


continue  to  shed  its  luster  with  an  increased 
radiance  that  neither  time  nor  tide  can  dim 
nor  obscure. 

All  this  has  a  special  bearing  on  the  work 
of  the  pastor,  since  nowhere  does  personality 
count  for  so  much.  The  exuberant  soul  over¬ 
flows  because  he  is  not  living  from  hand  to 
mouth  but  has  an  excess  of  resourcefulness 
in  love  divine  all  loves  excelling.  Mdiether  as 
preacher  or  pastor,  he  thus  speaks  not  about 
things  but  out  of  things.^  Pastoral  work  is 
not  merely  a  form  of  institutional  activity. 
It  is  the  ministry  of  comfort,  encouragement, 
direction,  which  makes  the  pastor  a  personal 
friend  and  not  an  ecclesiastical  oflScial.  His 
calls  are  not  made  primarily  to  remind  the 
people  of  the  church  services,  as  though  he 
were  a  messenger  boy;  nor  to  secure  funds  for 
the  enterprises  of  the  church,  as  if  he  were 
a  financial  agent;  nor  to  capture  new  arrivals 
in  town  before  the  man  of  the  church  round 
the  corner  does  it.  These  things  are  doubtless 
part  of  his  task,  but  his  chief  mission  is  that 
of  a  representative  of  religion.  To  be  sure, 
it  is  not  easy  to  leave  a  religious  impression 
in  every  home  nor  to  get  people  to  think  seri¬ 
ously  of  their  obligations  to  God  and  the 

*  Compare  Hutton:  That  the  Ministry  Be  Not  Blamed, 

p.  131. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  115 


church.  But  the  pastor  is  the  man  of  all  men 
who  should  mediate  the  presence  and  reality 
of  God  on  every  possible  occasion.  It  is  not 
the  number  of  calls  but  the  quality  that  counts; 
it  is  not  the  length  of  time  spent  but  its  char¬ 
acter  that  is  effectual  for  the  highest  well-being; 
it  is  not  the  sociability  cultivated  but  the 
spirituality  developed  that  means  much  or 
little  for  the  cause  of  Christ.  When  the  pastor 
becomes  known,  not  as  a  man  among  men — 
an  assumption  which  it  would  be  an  insult 
to  question — but,  rather,  as  the  guide  of  men, 
women,  and  children  in  the  things  that  really 
count,  then  the  glory  of  the  pastorate  is  seen 
in  the  bearing  of  fruit  unto  righteousness, 
truth,  and  blessedness. 

The  pastor  has  contacts  with  life  enjoyed 
by  no  other  person.  It  was  said  of  the  Shep¬ 
herd  and  Bishop  of  our  souls  that  “He  himself 
knew  what  was  in  man.”^  Surely,  his  under¬ 
shepherds  cannot  be  equipped  otherwise.  A 
deep  knowledge  of  human  nature  in  its  divers 
aspects  is  a  prime  requisite  of  the  pastor,  to 
be  obtained  by  him  in  the  laboratory  of  daily 
life  and  to  be  supplemented  by  the  most  exten¬ 
sive  study  of  literature,  which  is  the  literary 
expression  of  life  at  its  best  and  at  its  worst. 
“Psychology,”  says  Croce,  “is  like  the  index 


^John  i.  25. 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


116 

of  the  book  of  which  art  is  the  content.  The 
index  must  be  brought  into  agreement  with 
the  book,  of  which  it  will  always  be  an  imper¬ 
fect  representation,  not  the  book  into  agree¬ 
ment  wdth  the  index.”®  Psychology  offers  a 
point  of  view  rather  than  a  program  of  life; 
it  is  a  method  of  approach,  a  spirit  purged  of 
prejudice  and  open-minded  in  the  search  of 
truth.  The  psychological  study  of  life  is  thus 
an  indispensable  preliminary  to  effective  pas¬ 
toral  work.  If  he  is  a  trained  observer  and  a 
sympathetic  discerner,  the  pastor  could  arrive 
at  conclusions  of  the  greatest  moment  concern¬ 
ing  the  latent  possibilities  of  those  with  whom 
he  has  to  do.  Mliat  might  be  accomplished  in 
this  way  is  well  illustrated  in  the  following 
books:  The  Psychology  of  the  Christian  Soul 
and  The  Development  of  a  Christian  Soul,  both 
by  George  Steven,  an  Edinbmgh  pastor; 
Psychology  and  the  Christian  Life,  by  T.  W. 
Pym,  a  chaplain  of  the  Anglican  Church;  The 
Psychology  of  the  Christian  Life,  by  Eric  S. 
Waterhouse,  a  minister  of  the  Wesleyan  Meth¬ 
odist  Church;  The  Psychology  of  Christian  Life 
and  Behavior,  by  W.  S.  Bruce,  a  Scotch  minis¬ 
ter;  The  Disease  and  Remedy  of  Sin,  by  W. 
Mackintosh  Mackay,  a  Glasgow  pastor,  whose 

*Wildoii  Carr:  The  Philosophy  of  Benedetto  Croce,  p.  47. 
Compare  Croce:  Esthetic,  p.  87ff. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  117 


extraordinary  ability  as  an  interpreter  of  life 
is  also  seen  in  his  four  volumes  of  sermons  on 
Bible  Types  of  Modern  Men  and  Bible  Types 
of  Modern  Women.  Unlike  the  professional 
psychologist,  these  men  with  the  religious 
spirit  and  the  pastoral  instinct  united  with 
the  scientific  mind,  have  diagnosed  motives, 
analyzed  emotions,  interpreted  desires,  which 
give  clearer  perceptions  of  life,  free  from  the 
prepossessions  of  theories  and  in  closer  accord 
with  the  actualities  of  life.^ 

The  point  I  desire  to  stress  is  the  need  for 
an  inside  knowledge  of  life.  It  is  the  law  of 
affinity  that  explains  our  ability  to  enjoy  the 
productions  of  the  poet,  the  painter,  the  musi¬ 
cian,  the  dramatist.  We  ourselves  are  incapable 
of  reaching  the  sublime  heights  of  their  genius 
but  we  could  follow  them  even  though  afar 
off.  Our  humble  intuition  is  stimulated  and 
intensified  by  the  intuition  of  the  superb 
artist  who  quickens  our  sensibilities  and  en¬ 
riches  our  capacities.  In  like  manner  the 
seeing  pastor  deftly  touches  the  sensitive 
places  in  human  life  and  guides  people  in  the 
befitting  practical  expression  of  their  purposes. 
This  face-to-face  ministry  cannot  be  neglected 
even  by  the  great  preacher.  The  argument 


“  ’  Compare  my  article  on  “A  New  Appraisal  of  Religion” 

in  the  Methodist  Review,  September,  1912,  p.  725. 


118 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


that  some  are  called  to  be  pastors  and  others 
to  be  preachers  is  absurd,  chiefly  when  we 
remember  that  Jesus  combined  both  these 
functions.  Those  who  make  such  a  plea  forget 
that  the  preacher  addresses  real  persons,  and 
unless  he  understands  their  actual  needs  he 
might  become  a  pedantic  retailer  of  theological 
theories,  which,  however  eloquently  expressed, 
are  merely  echoes  and  not  direct  exhortations 
to  duty  in  view  of  the  immediate  situation. 
“The  preacher  has  admiration  for  his  peculiar 
reward,  but  the  pastor  has  affection;  if  the 
preacher  be  ill,  there  are  paragraphs  in  the 
newspapers;  if  the  pastor,  there  is  concern  in 
humble  homes.”^  Principal  Garvie  puts  the 
case  forcibly:  “The  man  who  in  the  interests 
of  the  pulpit  neglects  his  pastoral  duties,  unless 
he  is  exceptionally  gifted,  defeats  his  own 
end;  for  it  is  in  the  intimacy  of  pastoral  visita¬ 
tion  that  the  secrets  of  many  hearts  are  revealed 
to  him;  and  he  acquires  the  knowledge  which 
makes  his  sermons  human. One  of  the  more 
recent  books  on  the  subject  is  equally  explicit: 
“It  is  a  disaster  to  religion  when  the  office 


®  John  Watson:  The  Cure  of  Souls,  p.  224.  Reprinted  with 
permission  of  George  H.  Doran  Company. 

®  The  Christian  Preacher,  p.  331.  Reprinted  with  per¬ 
mission  of  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  119 


of  prophet  and  priest  become  detached.  As 
they  found  their  perfect  union  in  the  person 
of  our  Lord  and  Master  Jesus  Christ,  so  it  is 
our  duty  to  him  who  intrusts  us  with  his  divine 
commission  to  try  to  fulfil  faithfully  both  the 
prophetic  and  priestly  aspects  of  our  ministry.”^^ 
The  pastoral  office  requires  certain  definite 
qualifications,  to  be  cultivated  with  the  indus¬ 
trious  assiduity  of  the  most  ambitious  artist, 
keen  to  excel  in  his  profession.  The  pastor 
should  be  distinguished  by  the  possession  of 
the  virtue  of  inexhaustible  patience.  When 
you  think  of  the  petty  parochialism,  the  in¬ 
sipid  distemper,  the  captious  mannerism,  and 
the  almost  incredible  lapses  from  charity  of  the 
rank  and  file  of  church  folk,  nothing  but  the 
grace  of  God  could  sustain  the  pastor  in  the 
serenity  of  self-control  in  these  trying  circum¬ 
stances.  Doctor  Glover  draws  a  picture  of 
the  uncongenial  atmosphere  in  which  Milton 
lived,  and  adds  this  pregnant  sentence:  “It  is 
the  inconceivable  commonplaceness  of  the  men 
and  women  round  them  that  makes  tragedy 
of  the  lives  of  uncommon  men.”^^  But  tragedy 


Paul  B.  Bull:  Preaching  and  Sermon  Construction,  p.  1. 
Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company. 

“  T.  R.  Glover;  Poets  and  Puritans,  p.  36.  George  H. 
Doran  Company, 


no  THE  DYNAmC  MINISTRY 

must  be  turned  into  triumph.  Think  of  Jesus 
who  had  to  choose  such  unpromising  folk  to 
be  his  companions  because  he  could  get  no 
better,  to  whom  he  imparted  the  secrets  of 
the  Kingdom.  When  you  are  tempted  to 
complain  of  the  hardness  of  your  lot  and  how 
insufferably  tantalizing  are  some  of  your  pas¬ 
toral  experiences,  recall  that  unique  ministry 
under  the  Syrian  blue  and  the  wonderful 
talents  that  were  consecrated  to  the  training 
of  the  twelve.  Then  rejoice  that  you  are 
coworkers  with  him  in  the  high  mission  of 
building  Christian  character,  and  that  in  his 
magnanimous  companionship  you  could  never 
fail.  For  instance,  try  to  introduce  some 
innovations,  and  the  party  of  opposition  will 
fall  on  you  with  the  force  of  a  sledge-hammer. 
The  misery  of  it  is  that  those  who  resist,  be¬ 
cause  averse  to  change,  are  among  your  best 
people.  You  should  reckon  with  the  prejudices 
of  inherited  custom.  Do  not  forget  in  your 
eager  enthusiasm  that  what  you  have  been 
thinking  for  a  long  time  cannot  be  accepted 
in  a  short  time  by  those  who  have  given  no 
thought  to  the  matter,  and  whose  temperament 
is  a  handicap  to  religious  enterprise.  The 
lack  of  the  impartiality  of  patience  would  thus 
lead  you  into  courses  which  might  indefinitely 
delay  the  progress  of  the  work,  and  that  would 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  121 


be  most  unfortunate.  Do  not  lose  sight  of 
the  larger  things  in  your  keenness  to  push  one 
item  of  interest.  Above  all,  guard  against 
the  folly  of  obsessions  and  keep  out  the  fly 
from  the  ointment. 

Lest  it  be  thought  that  all  is  unrelieved 
depression,  remember  the  annals  of  the  average 
congregation.  Sinclair  Lewis  has  made  America 
conscious  of  Main  Street.  On  that  highway 
are  the  stores,  the  lodge,  the  post  office,  the 
druggist,  the  doctors,  the  churches,  the  school, 
and  some  homes.  What  about  the  other 
avenues  and  streets.?  The  average  town  is 
not  all  drab  and  insipid.  The  romance  of 
sacrifice,  the  beauty  of  love,  the  joy  of  kind¬ 
ness,  the  serenity  of  service,  the  genuineness  of 
patriotism,  above  all,  the  idealisms  and  com¬ 
forts  of  religion,  are  also  found  in  every  com¬ 
munity.  So  also  with  the  local  church.  ‘‘The 
influence  of  the  Christian  congregation  upon 
history,  the  contribution  of  the  parish  to  the 
world,  is  a  subject  which  is  waiting  for  a  his¬ 
torian.  He  will  lay  bare  a  thousand  almost 
forgotten  wells,  which  from  the  centuries  still 
feed  some  of  the  strongest  currents  of  human 
life.  Many  types  of  character,  much  that  is 
imperishable  in  literature  and  art,  much  that 
has  become  world-wide  in  education  and  the 
organization  of  charity  have  found  their  origins 


122 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


in  congregational  In  spite  of  much 

that  was  sordid  and  disgusting,  Browning 
tells  us  in  “Christmas  Eve”  of  the  light  that 
never  was  on  sea  or  land,  that  shone  out  of 
the  lives  of  the  worshipers  in  that  little  chapel 
of  “  ‘Mount  Zion’  with  Love-lane  at  the  back 
of  it.”  Thus  has  it  always  been.  When  the 
story  is  summed  up  no  small  place  will  be 
given  to  the  faithful  pastors,  who  showed  pity 
without  self-pity,  and  patience  with  the  long- 
suffering  and  tenderness  and  forbearance  and 
goodness  of  the  Christ  of  our  emancipation. 

Candor  is  an  indispensable  virtue  of  the  man 
who  would  serve  in  this  highest  sphere.  “If 
it  were  not  so,  I  would  have  told  you,”  said 
the  Candid  Christ  to  his  disciples  in  the  upper 
room.^^  He  implied  that  his  dealings  with 
them  had  always  been  frank,  straightforward, 
and  outspoken.  He  showed  no  reserve  as 
though  he  suspected  or  mistrusted  them.  He 
gave  them  of  his  best  and  they  had  every 
reason  to  rely  on  him.  He  was  not  tactful  in 
the  ordinary  sense  of  that  much  misused  word. 
Generally  understood,  tact  is  a  species  of 
make-believe,  a  patching  up,  a  glossing  over. 


Sir  George  Adam  Smith:  Tke  Forgiveness  of  Sins  and 
Other  Sermons,  p.  232.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  George 
H.  Doran  Company. 

“  John  14.  2. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  123 


a  postponing  of  settlement,  a  beating  about 
the  bush.  The  phrase  “playing  politics”  is 
suggestive  of  this  practice  which  gives  proof 
of  a  want  of  self-respect.  Jesus  was  tactful 
in  the  same  sense  that  he  faced  reality.  He 
was  sincere  without  rudeness,  true  without 
bitterness,  outspoken  without  bluntness,  frank 
without  selfishness,  impartial  without  evasive¬ 
ness.  He  meant  what  he  said  and  he  said 
what  he  meant,  not  to  offend  but  to  defend 
his  hearers  from  the  perversions  of  ignorance 
and  the  panic  of  despair.  In  doing  this  he  did 
not  wholly  escape  the  misunderstanding  of 
the  bigoted  and  the  opposition  of  duplicity,  but 
these  encounters  would  have  been  inevitable 
under  any  circumstances.  How  refreshing  to 
breathe  the  open-air  atmosphere  of  the  genial 
and  generous  and  crystal-pure  spirit  of  the 
Son  of  man!  His  welcome  by  the  earnest 
was  a  tacit  censure  of  those  who  discarded 
him.  A  good  rule  which  Struthers  followed 
was  to  visit  most  of  all  the  people  he  was 
most  unwilling  to  visit.  To  be  sure,  visitation 
is  always  a  spiritual  labor  and  an  exhausting 
toil,  and  it  exacts  heavy  toll  from  our  nerve 
force.  Hear  what  Pepper,  a  layman,  has  to 
say  about  this.  “A  visit  to  some  houses  is  a 
pleasant  experience.  A  call  at  others  requires 
an  output  of  will-power.  But  the  minister 


124 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


should  not  work  along  lines  of  least  resistance. 
He  is  probably  most  needed  where  it  is  hard¬ 
est  for  him  to  go.”^^  In  these  conditions,  the 
people  could  talk  back  to  him.  But  what  an 
opportunity  to  disarm  misunderstanding,  to  nip 
trouble  in  the  bud,  to  untie  in  time  what  if 
neglected  might  prove  to  be  a  Gordian  knot, 
to  encourage  the  perplexed  to  seek  for  guidance 
and  counsel  from  the  pastor  in  preference  to 
any  other  person.  If  candor  is  a  necessity  in 
the  pulpit,  it  is  doubly  so.  in  the  pastorate, 
where  it  is  more  difficult  to  practice,  par¬ 
ticularly  in  those  delicate  situations  which 
confront  one.  But  it  is  treacherous  to  be 
evasive,  however  exhausting  it  might  be  to  be 
positive. 

When  we  regard  the  pastor  as  a  priest  we 
are  not  thinking  of  sacramentarian  functions 
but  of  that  sympathetic  service  of  instruction 
and  guidance  to  those  suffering  from  “personal 
distress  and  melancholy  despair,”  due  to  intel¬ 
lectual  confusion,  ethical  discord  or  spiritual 
uncertainty.  Be  a  good  listener,  for  it  has 
often  happened  that  when  a  person  pours  out 
his  troubles  he  is  thinking  aloud,  and  when 
he  is  through,  the  light  has  broken,  not  because 
of  anything  you  said,  but  because  your  pres¬ 
ence  imparted  sympathy,  which  he  urgently 


G.  W.  Pepper:  A  Voice  from  the  Crowd,  p.  86. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  125 


needed,  to  set  him  right.  Here  is  a  significant 
testimony  from  a  recent  biography:  “My  father 
was  a  brilliant  conversationalist,  but  he  had 
also  that  other  gift,  which  rarely  goes  along 
with  it — he  was  a  'perfect  listener.  He  was  so 
eager  a  listener  that  his  friends  and  all  who 
came  to  him  spoke  better  in  his  presence  than 
was  their  wont  in  other  places.”  One  of  his 
colleagues  wrote  of  this  same  man:  “I  have 
seen  him  confound  an  old  fox  of  a  man  by 
sheer  candor.  He  left  the  enemy  breathless 
with  surprise  at  a  simplicity  he  had  thought 
faded  out  of  the  world  with  Eden.  The  man’s 
arts  would  have  been  a  match  for  any  arts 
they  encountered,  but  artlessness  dumbfounded 
him.  The  armor  of  light  not  only  defended 
the  wearer  but  dismayed  the  assailant.”^® 
If  he  has  the  right  sort  of  a  discerning  spirit, 
what  untold  good  the  pastor  might  do  in 
guiding  the  ambitions  of  young  people,  turn¬ 
ing  some  to  college,  others  to  the  ministry, 
others  to  the  kind  of  vocation  for  which  train¬ 
ing  would  best  fit  them,  and  all  of  them  to 
Christ,  who  winsomely  appeals  to  these  in  the 
wonderment  and  amazement  of  adolescent  days. 

The  evils  of  the  confessional  are  a  fact  of 
history  but  the  idea  underlying  this  institution 

Love  and  Life.  The  Story  of  J.  Denholm  Brash.  By 
his  Son,  p.  162ff.  The  Epworth  Press,  London. 


126 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


is  one  of  spiritual  and  ethical  direction.  If 
this  is  offered  in  a  fraternal  spirit,  those  who 
seek  such  help  will  realize  that  they  are  coming 
to  a  brother  man  with  a  larger  experience, 
even  though  in  point  of  years  he  may  be  younger 
than  many  of  the  seekers.  I  am  increasingly 
impressed  with  the  strategic  importance  of 
this  kind  of  work  and  of  its  rich  compensa¬ 
tions.  Christian  Counsel,  by  David  Smith; 
Problems  and  Perplexities,  by  W.  E.  Orchard; 
A  Spiritual  Pilgrimage,  by  R.  J.  Campbell, 
show  what  wonderful  results  could  be  obtained 
by  the  pastor  who  secures  the  confidence  of 
his  people  and  who  encourages  them  to  come 
to  him  with  their  vexed  and  vexing  questions. 
In  view  of  Protestant  prejudices  against  any¬ 
thing  that  savors  of  Romanism,  the  word 
“consultation”  might  be  used  instead  of  “con¬ 
fessional,”  but  the  fact  remains  that  what¬ 
ever  the  name,  this  opportunity  for  helpfulness 
should  be  made  possible.^®  The  British  Weekly 
and  several  other  religious  papers  in  Great 
Britain  have  a  weekly  column  for  inquirers. 
Such  a  feature  might  be  introduced  by  our 
American  journals  with  decided  advantages. 
It  would  at  least  help  the  laity  to  think  through 
questions  of  vital  interest. 

Happy  is  the  pastor  who  has  the  sense  of 


“  Compare  my  volume,  Essentials  of  Evangelism^  p.  163f. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  127 


humor.  Carlyle  said  of  it:  “The  essence  of 
humor  is  sensibility:  warm,  tender,  fellow- 
feeling  with  all  forms  of  existence.  True 
humor  springs  not  more  from  the  head  than 
from  the  heart;  it  is  not  contempt,  its  essence 
is  love;  it  issues  not  in  laughter,  but  in  smiles 
which  lie  deeper.  It  is,  in  fact,  the  bloom  and 
perfume,  the  purest  effulgence  of  a  deep,  fine, 
and  loving  nature;  a  nature  in  harmony  with 
itself,  reconciled  to  the  world,  and  its  stinted- 
ness  and  contradiction — nay,  finding  in  this 
very  contradiction  new  elements  of  beauty 
as  well  as  goodness.”^^  Humor  helps  us  to 
think  more  kindly  of  people  and  to  make 
allowance  for  their  otherwise  intolerable  eccen¬ 
tricities.  Wit  has  a  strain  of  sarcasm  while 
humor  has  sympathy.  The  solemn  countenance 
is  often  suggestive  of  the  fanatic,  whose  fan¬ 
tastic  ways  prove  him  to  be  without  balance, 
and  who  is  so  apt  to  strain  out  the  gnat  and 
swallow  the  camel.  But  one  whose  face  is 
wreathed  in  smiles  and  from  whose  eyes  the 
light  of  geniality  radiates,  is  like  a  ray  of 
sunshine  after  a  cloudy  and  dark  day.  “Peren¬ 
nial  sunniness” — that  was  how  Phillips  Brooks 
was  described  by  one  who  crossed  the  ocean 
with  him.  His  Life  by  Professor  Allen  is 
worth  reading  to  find  out  the  secret  of  his 


Quoted  by  Glover:  Pods  and  Puritans,  p.  290. 


128 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


radiant  character.  Principal  Forsyth  pointed 
out  that  Christian  art  developed  from  the 
fantastic  to  the  grotesque  and  then  to  the 
picturesque.  “Now,  the  great  outburst  of 
humor  in  Art  in  the  Middle  Age  is  due  ulti¬ 
mately,  but  not  consciously,  to  the  importa¬ 
tion  into  all  the  world’s  affairs  of  the  new 
feeling  of  the  Infinite.  It  could  not  happen 
in  the  first  years  of  Christianity,  for  then  the 
Infinite  was  too  near  and  solemnizing  a  presence. 
The  soul  was  absorbed  and  engaged  with  God. 
But  when  the  newness  of  the  Divine  Presence 
was  removed  without  taking  away  the  security, 
and  the  dazzled  eyes  returned  to  the  light 
and  objects  of  common  earth,  then  the  dis¬ 
parity,  the  contrast,  began  to  be  felt  and  it 
was  joined  with  a  great  pity;  and  then  there 
stole  over  the  face  of  Europe  the  dawn  of  that 
tender  and  sympathetic  smile.  .  .  .  The  gro¬ 
tesque  art  of  the  IVIiddle  Ages,  and  the  sweeter, 
deeper  humor  of  a  later  time,  stand  out  upon 
a  background  of  the  merciful  and  gracious 
eternity  assured  by  the  revelation  of  Christ.”^® 
What  an  attractive  theme  to  discuss,  but 
surely  a  far  more  attractive  experience  to 
possess.  And  blessed  is  the  pastor  who  has  it, 

P.  T.  Forsyth:  Christ  on  Parnassus.  Lectures  on  Art, 
Ethic  and  Theology,  p.  93f.  Reprinted  with  permission  of 
George  H.  Doran  Company. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE 


129 


to  encounter  the  foibles  and  follies  of  his  people, 
their  peccadilloes  and  prevarications,  their 
excuses  and  evasions,  their  childishness  and 
priggishness,  their  crankiness  and  dullness, 
their  snobbishness  and  pettiness,  without  losing 
heart,  and,  what  is  worse,  without  losing  his 
temper d®  “It  is  easy  just  to  be  impatient 

and  restless.  The  lay  mind  is  a  very  elusive 
thing.  It  is  at  many  stages  of  development 
from  apathy  upward.  It  is  seldom  articulate 
on  any  religious  topic,  and  when  articulate 
it  is  more  often  critical  than  constructive.”^ 
The  fact  of  humor  implies  the  other  fact  of 
cheerfulness.  You  are  the  representative  of 
the  gospel  of  good  tidings  and  you  must  have 
the  buoyancy  of  good  cheer.  Some  people  are 
sour  and  morose  because  they  cannot  have 
their  own  way;  others  are  suspicious  and  bitter 
because  their  ideas  have  not  carried;  others 
are  petty  and  provoking  because  of  thought¬ 
less  selfishness  parading  in  the  guise  of  dis¬ 
interestedness.  The  pastor  should  be  strictly 
impartial  and  hold  the  mean  between  the 

^  For  an  illustration  of  humor  in  public  life,  though  often 
caustic  and  expressive  of  a  fiery  temper,  not  without  the 
strain  of  tenderness,  read  The  Life  of  Sir  William  Harcourt 
bv  A.  G.  Gardiner. 

^  Report  of  Archbishops’  Committee  on  The  Worship  of 
the  Church,  p.  33.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Mac¬ 
millan  Company. 


130 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


extremists  of  conservatism  and  of  radicalism, 
and,  like  Paul,  he  should  be  ‘‘gentle  ...  as  when 
a  nurse  cherisheth  her  own  children. There 
is  little  hope  and  much  scandal  if  he  surrenders 
to  the  spirit  of  ill  will  or  becomes  censorious 
or  lets  despair  lay  its  fevered  hands  on  his 
soul.  “In  the  world  ye  have  tribulation:  but 
be  of  good  cheer;  I  have  overcome  the  world,” 
said  the  gracious  Cheer-Bringer.^^  Without  the 
courage  of  cheer,  you  cannot  divert  the  streams 
of  panic  and  turn  on  the  rivers  of  refreshing 
grace.  Lord  Rosebery  said  of  Doctor  Chal¬ 
mers:  “He  did  not  shrink  from  his  fellow  men: 
on  the  contrary,  he  sought  them,  for  it  was 
the  business  of  his  life  to  permeate  them  with 
his  message.  Yet,  like  the  Duke  of  Wellington, 
he  had  no  small  talk.  Mr.  Gladstone,  who 
accompanied  him  on  some  of  his  pastoral 
visits,  said  that  he  sat  embarrassed  and  silent. 
In  Glasgow  too  he  would  perhaps  only  utter 
a  blessing  or  a  short  prayer  on  such  occasions. 
But  his  visits  were  prized,  for  he  radiated 
benevolence.”^^  What,  then,  shall  we  say  of 
courtesy  and  consideration.^  “Be  a  gentleman 


21  1  Thessalonians  2.  7. 

22  John  16.  33. 

23  Rosebery:  Miscellanies  Literary  and  Historical,  vol.  I, 
p.  247.  Reprinted  with  permission  of  George  H.  Doran 
Company. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  131 


always,  although  a  gentleman  unafraid,”  said 
Pepper.  “No  doubt  he  is  a  Christian;  but  he 
is  not  a  gentleman,”  was  the  criticism  of  a 
preacher  who  was  earnest  but  not  enlightened, 
and  who  gravely  erred  when  he  took  liberties 
with  good  taste,  and  thought  he  could  convict 
the  conscience  by  offending  the  sensibilities  of 
his  hearers.  We  have  surely  not  so  learned 
Christ. 

The  true  pastor  moves  about  as  “the  father 
of  his  people,”  helping  to  develop  Christian 
experience,  and  to  stimulate  lives  for  the 
expansive  influence  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 
To  be  sure,  he  is  a  wise  administrator,  and  on 
this  subject  a  whole  chapter  might  be  written 
on  questions  of  organization,  management, 
finance,  and  the  like.^^  His  chief  work  in  this 
respect  is  to  train  leaders  and  to  distribute 
responsibility  and  so  build  up  the  church  that 
it  will  more  efficiently  serve  the  community 
and  magnify  the  cause  of  Christ.  “What 
tires  a  man  in  the  ministry  and  makes  him  in 
secret  sad  is  the  feeling  which  comes  over  him 
— let  loose  often  by  some  trivial  occasion — 
that  his  work  is  not  worth  while;  that  it  is  not 
a  man’s  full  work,  that  it  has  nothing  of  the 

^  Compare  Merrill:  The  Freedom  of  the  Preacher,  for  a 
wise  discussion  in  the  chapter  on  “The  Administratoi;,” 
p.  78ff. 


132 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


urgency  and  obvious  value  of  work  done  with 
the  hands;  of  less  value  maybe  than  the  work 
of  a  politician  or  a  publicist. This  subtle 
temptation  could  be  met  and  overcome,  as 
one  sees  and  seizes  the  manifold  opportunities 
found  in  the  pastorate  for  the  versatile  talents 
of  the  most  gifted.  Let  us  not  minimize  our 
calling  or  give  occasion  to  any  to  regard  it  as 
a  superfluous  vocation.  Indeed,  there  are  no 
limits  to  the  usefulness  of  the  pastor,  who 
conceives  his  task  as  a  trust  from  God,  who 
applies  himself  to  the  better  equipment  of 
himself  by  study  and  prayer,  who  gives  of  his 
best  in  ungrudging  service,  “for  the  perfecting 
of  the  saints,  unto  the  work  of  ministering, 
unto  the  building  up  of  the  body  of  Christ; 
till  we  all  attain  unto  the  unity  of  the  faith, 
and  of  the  knowledge  of  the  Son  of  God,  unto 
a  full  grown  man,  unto  the  measure  of  the 
stature  of  the  fullness  of  Christ.”^® 

25  Hutton:  That  the  Ministry  Be  Not  Blamed,  p.  34. 

26  Ephesians  4.  12f. 


THE  GENEROUS  PASTORATE  133 

SUGGESTED  READING 

A.  Theory  and  Practice^^ 

Charles  E.  Jefferson:  The  Building  of  the  Church. 
Henry  Sloane  Coffin :  In  a  Day  of  Social  Rebuilding. 
Washington  Gladden:  The  Christian  Pastor. 
William  A.  Quayle:  The  Pastor-Preacher. 

W.  P.  Merrill:  The  Freedom  of  the  Preacher. 
Albert  J.  Lyman:  The  Christian  Pastor  in  the  New 
Age. 

John  Watson:  The  Cure  of  Souls. 

Charles  H.  Parkhurst:  The  Pulpit  and  the  Pew. 
A.  T.  Robertson :  The  Glory  of  the  Ministry. 
George  W.  Pepper:  A  Voice  from  the  Crowd. 

Jeff  D.  Ray:  The  Highest  Office. 

W.  H.  P.  Faunce:  The  Educational  Ideal  in  the 
Ministry. 

Richard  Baxter:  The  Reformed  Pastor. 

John  Kelman:  The  War  and  Preaching. 

James  A.  Beebe:  The  Pastoral  Office. 

Ernest  C.  Wareing:  Critical  Hours  in  the  Preach¬ 
ers  Life. 

Damon  Dalrj'mple:  The  Mantle  of  Elijah. 

David  Smith:  Christian  Counsel. 

William  De  Witt  Hyde:  The  Gospel  of  Good  Will. 

B.  Biography  and  Letters 

A.  V.  G.  Allen:  Phillips  Brooks. 

George  R.  Grose:  James  W.  Bashford. 

A.  W.  W.  Dale:  The  Life  of  R.  W.  Dale. 

^  For  books  written  from  the  standpoint  of  psychology, 
see  page  116. 


134 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


Stephen  Paget:  Henry  Scott  Holland. 

R.  F.  Horton:  An  Autobiography. 

Dorothea  Pi  Hughes:  The  Life  of  Hugh  Price 
Hughes. 

W.  Robertson  Nicoll:  Ian  Maclaren.  The  Life 
of  John  Watson. 

Early  Letters  of  Marcus  Dods. 

A  Labrador  Doctor:  The  Autobiography  of  W.  T. 
Grenfell. 

W.  P.  Livingstone:  The  Life  of  Robert  Laws  of 
Livingstonia. 

Letters  of  Principal  James  Denney  to  His  Family 
and  Friends. 

Canon  Barnett:  His  Life,  Work  and  Friends. 

D.  Macmillan:  The  Life  of  George  Matheson. 

Harold  Begbie:  The  Life  of  General  William  Booth. 

George  A.  Smith:  The  Life  of  Henry  Drummond. 

J.  H.  Melish:  Franklin  Spencer  Spaulding. 

Sir  Henry  Jones:  Old  Memories. 

A  Gentleman  with  a  Duster:  Painted  Windows. 

William  R.  Moody :  The  Life  of  Dwight  L.  Moody. 

Arthur  Porritt:  The  Best  I  Remember. 

Joseph  Fort  Newton:  Some  Living  Masters  of  the 
Pulpit. 


V 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


‘‘Having  a  great  priest  over  the  house  of  God; 
let  us  draw  near  with  a  true  heart  in  fulness  of 
faith.” — Hebrews  10.  21. 

“Public  worship  is  a  force  to  be  carefully  safe¬ 
guarded  and  constantly  strengthened.  A  church 
becomes  a  more  effective  working  church  when 
it  has  once  learned  to  pray  and  sing.  Bringing  the 
heart  to  the  throne  of  grace  increases  all  its  capac¬ 
ities  and  makes  it  capable  of  larger  service.  Public 
worship,  moreover,  is  the  testimony  which  the 
church  bears  to  the  community  of  its  faith  in  God 
who  has  revealed  himself  in  Christ.  For  this  reason 
public  worship  should  be  full-toned  and  jubilant. 
To  give  it  a  richer  and  more  penetrating  tone,  to 
impart  to  it  a  higher  beauty,  to  suffuse  it  with  a 
more  solemnizing  and  subduing  spirit,  is  to  increase 
the  power  of  the  church,  not  only  over  the  lives 
of  its  members  but  over  the  feeling  of  the  com¬ 
munity.  Church  attendance  is  not  for  Christians 
an  elective.  A  congregation  devoutly  engaged  in 
worship  is  doing  something  for  the  community 
which  cannot  be  done  in  any  other  way.  It  is  a 
collective  confession  of  Christ  which  outruns  in 
influence  the  confession  of  any  one  individual,  no 
matter  how  exalted.” — Charles  E.  Jefferson:  The 
Building  of  the  Church,  p.  178.  ^ 

^  Reprinted  with  permission  of  The  Macmillan  Company, 
Publishers,  New  York  City. 


CHAPTER  V 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 

What  is  the  greatest  need  of  the  church? 
To  cultivate  her  spiritual  life  in  order  that  her 
testimony  might  be  with  power.  ‘‘Great  grace 
was  upon  them  all,”  was  said  of  the  early 
church.2  This  fact  explains  the  growing  influ¬ 
ence  and  pervasive  control  of  the  church  of 
that  day  far  better  than  any  other  considera¬ 
tion.  That  company  of  Christians  excelled  in 
an  earnest  belief  in  “the  magnificence  of 
prayer,”  and  the  atmosphere  in  which  they 
lived  was  saturated  in  worship.  They  had 
little  of  outward  success  so  far  as  material 
advantages  were  concerned.  On  the  contrary, 
they  were  exposed  to  acute  criticism  and  sharp 
persecution.  This  did  not  surprise  them. 
They  were  taught  to  expect  the  vilifying  of 
many,  for  they  had  the  guarantee  of  the  Divine 
Spirit  that  all  who  “would  live  godly  in  Christ 
Jesus  shall  suffer  persecution.”^  They,  how- 


2  Acts  4.  33. 

®  2  Timothy  3.  12. 

137 


138 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


ever,  overcame  “because  of  the  blood  of  the 
Lamb,  and  because  of  the  word  of  their  testi¬ 
mony;  and  they  loved  not  their  life  even  unto 
death.  Their  declaration  and  demeanor 
were  distinguished  by  four  notes,  which  made 
harmonious  music  to  the  glory  of  God  and  his 
Christ.  The  evangelical  note  brought  out  their 
love  for  the  Christ  of  the  cross,  expressing 
their  profound  interest  in  the  atonement,  as 
the  most  efficacious  deed  in  leading  them  out 
of  the  darkness  of  sin  into  the  light  of  holiness. 
The  ethical  note  stressed  the  thought  of  obliga¬ 
tion,  even  at  the  cost  of  sacrifice,  to  give  proof 
by  the  works  of  righteousness,  truth,  and 
purity,  in  a  world  steeped  in  iniquity.  The 
social  note  made  evident  the  necessity  of 
fellowship,  first  for  their  own  spiritual  develop¬ 
ment  and  then  for  the  performance  of  public 
duties  in  the  name  of  the  kingdom  of  God, 
not  by  offering  any  economic  programs  but  by 
setting  forth  the  dynamic  principles  whose 
application  in  divers  fields  and  among  all 
nations  would  make  for  the  redemption  and 
reconstruction  of  the  life  of  the  individual  and 
6f  society.  The  mystical  note  gave  meaning 
and  momentum  to  the  other  thi'ee;  it  had  to 
do  with  the  genuine  inwardness  of  things,  of 
the  life  hid  with  Christ  in  God,  of  the  walk 


*  Revelation  12.  11. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


139 


in  heavenly  places  in  Christ,  of  the  communion 
ineffably  sublime  which  gave  them  the  assur¬ 
ance  that  they  were  a  spiritual  priesthood 
unto  God. 

We  think  of  the  early  church  as  a  society 
of  worship.  Recall  the  doxologies  of  the  New 
Testament,  and  you  will  at  once  see  that 
these  believers  were  transported  above  the 
things  of  time  and  sense  into  fairer  realms  of 
day.  For  that  reason  they  were  able  to  serve 
their  generation  in  all  manner  of  well-being 
and  well-doing.  They  acknowledged  the  pri¬ 
macy  of  religion  as  an  all-comprehending  spirit 
of  life.  They  realized  that  religious  culture, 
because  it  fertilizes  the  central  affections  and 
aspirations,  is  an  all-embracing  enterprise. 
They  rejoiced  in  the  experience  of  supernatural 
virtues  as  the  redemption  from  bondage  to 
the  manysided  tyranny  of  an  evil  world  order. 
They  were  thus  released  from  the  world  that 
they  might  more  effectually  serve  God  in  the 
world.  The  supernatural  which  is  the  spiritual 
at  its  highest  was  the  abiding  feature  of  their 
behavior.  They  knew  that  all  the  resources 
of  the  heavenly  Father’s  empire  of  reality 
were  at  their  call  for  the  legitimate  require¬ 
ments  of  their  errand.  In  them  was  therefore 
realized  the  truth  of  the  words  of  Jesus,  that 
those  who  believe  on  him  shall  do  even  greater 


140  THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 

works  than  he  did  in  the  power  of  the  divine 
Spirit.^  Their  faith  was  also  nourished  by 
prolonged  seasons  of  prayer,  and,  since  they 
were  recipients  of  a  supernatural  gift,  they 
were  persuaded  that  they  could  achieve,  and 
they  actually  did,  what  the  world  regarded 
as  the  impossible.  But  they  had  no  monopoly 
in  the  powers  of  the  world  to  come.  If  we  have 
a  like  faith,  we  also  may  discover  the  un¬ 
fathomed  possibilities  of  God  in  Christ  and 
demonstrate  the  might  of  the  divine  re¬ 
demption. 

Here,  then,  is  the  crux  of  the  whole  matter. 
New  methods  and  improved  machinery  are 
not  to  be  discounted,  but  more  important  is 
the  deepened  consciousness  of  the  omnipresence 
of  God  here  and  now,  and  of  his  prevailing 
power  with  and  in  and  through  us,  so  that  we 
shall  learn  and  know  the  genius  of  New-Testa- 
ment  optimism,  which  “beholds  redemption 
puissantly  at  work.”  This  is  the  burden  of 
Dr.  J.  H.  Jowett’s  recent  appeal.  “Let  the 
church,”  he  wrote,  “bravely  begin  to  realize 
the  larger  ranges  of  her  influence.  Much  of 
her  weakness  springs  from  her  ignorance  of 
her  power.  Let  her  consult  her  title-deeds, 
let  her  explore  the  wealth  of  her  resources, 
and  in  bold  and  loyal  venture  let  her  openly 


®  John  14.  12. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


141 


work  for  the  Lord’s  will  to  be  done  on  earth 
even  as  it  is  done  in  heaven.”® 

In  the  face  of  this  summons,  many  of  the 
criticisms  of  the  church  are  jejune.  Some 
critics  seem  to  go  on  the  assumption  that  we 
are  disembodied  spirits.  We,  however,  need 
some  sort  of  organization  to  express  the  reli¬ 
gious  spirit  through  worship  and  work.  Under 
present  circumstances  this  must  obtain  through 
the  church.  And,  indeed,  this  is  so  realized 
by  those  who  have  the  historical  consciousness 
and  who  are  convinced  that  the  church  is  one 
of  the  indispensable  assets  of  society.  They 
also  recognize  that  sensible  changes  are  neces¬ 
sary  for  her  more  effective  usefulness.  She 
has  failed  whenever  the  order  of  importance 
has  been  inverted  and  work  allowed  to  take 
precedence  over  worship.  The  fundamental 
aim  of  worship  is  to  provide  fellowship  by 
filial  communion  with  God  and  fraternal  con¬ 
tact  with  mankind,  in  such  ways  as  shall 
develop  the  virtues  of  reverence,  faith,  good¬ 
ness,  and  counteract  the  vices  of  flippancy, 
suspicion,  contention,  and  drab  ugliness.  Wor¬ 
ship  is  a  native  instinct,  but  the  way  in  which 
this  spontaneous  outflow  of  the  soul  expresses 

®  Compare  A.  G.  Hogg:  Redemption  from  This  Worlds 
or  The  Supernatural  in  Christianity.  A  most  penetrating 
discussion  of  the  secret  of  Jesus  and  of  the  Apostolic  Church. 


142 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


itself  depends  upon  the  object  toward  which 
it  is  directed  and  the  manner  in  which  it  is 
conducted.  Worship  has  been  well  described 
as  “the  mother  of  all  arts/’  comprehending 
with  understanding  the  needs  of  the  soul  and 
comprehensive  in  the  exercise  of  its  healing 
influence  over  the  whole  of  life.  The  enrich¬ 
ment  that  would  follow  this  serious  effort  is 
contingent  on  the  provision  made  for  the 
perfection  of  the  approach  to  God  through  all 
the  agencies  that  appeal  to  our  manifold  de¬ 
mands  for  fuller  and  deeper  life. 

A  truly  catholic  worship  should  satisfy  all 
temperaments  and  all  legitimate  tastes.  We 
have  concentrated  far  too  much  on  a  few 
forms  to  the  impoverishment  of  our  Protestant 
worship,  with  the  further  result  that  many 
earnest  souls  have  been  alienated  from  us 
because  their  needs  were  superficially  met. 
When  we  further  realize  that  there  is  a  widely 
prevalent  dissatisfaction  with  the  existing  forms 
of  worship  in  liturgical  and  nonliturgical 
churches,  and  that  many  regard  worship,  “the 
most  conspicuous  symbol  of  religion,”  as  both 
tedious  and  unnecessary,  it  is  not  enough  to 
reply  that  these  complaints  are  due  to  irre- 
ligion  and  indifference.  A  traveling  salesman, 
after  visiting  several  churches  in  all  parts  of 
the  country,  reached  the  conclusion  that  the 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


143 


average  nonliturgical  church  building  is  de¬ 
signed  as  an  auditorium  and  not  as  a  shrine, 
where  the  service  does  not  satisfy  the  craving 
for  worship,  although  the  sermon  is  often 
edifying;  on  the  other  hand,  he  found  that 
the  liturgical  type  of  church  building,  while 
designed  as  a  house  of  prayer  with  an  atmos¬ 
phere  of  reverence  and  worship,  has  a  liturgy 
that  reflects  the  sixteenth  century  and  touches 
lightly  the  complex  needs  of  to-day,  while  the 
sermon  in  only  exceptional  instances  is  worth 
hearing^  Is  no  middle  ground  possible  where 
the  benefits  of  shrine  and  sermon  might  be 
combined?  Could  there  be  no  synthesis  of  the 
Protestant  or  evangelical  emphasis  and  the 
Catholic  or  sacramental  emphasis,  making 
room  for  the  three  types  of  free,  silent  and 
liturgical  worship?  Thus  only  would  we 
acquire  a  better  perspective  and  have  a  sense 
of  more  balanced  proportion  to  produce  higher 
harmony,  deeper  fellowship,  and  more  Christ- 
like  conduct. 

Some  such  arrangement  assumes  a  man¬ 
datory  aspect  when  we  consider  the  ruthless 
invasion  of  paganism  upon  modern  life.  The 
subtle  attacks  upon  the  home  by  the  facilities 
for  divorce;  the  vulgarising  of  towns  and 
cities  by  the  insidious  play  of  a  “moral  material- 


^  Compare  The  Christian  Century,  September  15, 1921,  p.l7. 


144 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


i^m”  that  is  preoccupied  with  quantity  and 
cares  less  for  choice  products;  the  increasing 
tendency  to  standardize  life  so  that  a  drab 
conventionalism  compels  a  uniformity  which 
is  mistaken  for  social  equality;  the  demand 
for  quick  returns  which  places  a  premium  on 
action  to  the  virtual  disregard  of  reflection 
and  which  encourages  a  jostling  after  the  front 
seats,  not  always  in  a  spirit  of  malicious  com¬ 
petition  but  oftener  with  a  desire  for  achieve¬ 
ment;  the  tedious  routine  in  the  struggle  for 
existence  which  overemphasizes  the  mechanical 
output  and  tacitly  overlooks  the  inevitable 
restrictions  imposed  on  the  mental,  moral, 
social,  and  spiritual  faculties;  the  unsettlement 
and  disturbances  of  constant  shifting  from 
one  place  to  another  due  to  housing  and  other 
economic  diflSculties — these  are  among  the 
features  of  our  current  life  which  prove  that 
the  shaft  has  not  sunk  down  to  bedrock  and 
that  the  tumult  and  movement  are  only  on 
the  surface.  “The  enrichment  of  worship 
appears  to  be  a  correlate  of  the  increasing 
impoverishment  of  personality  that  men  expe¬ 
rience  in  their  occupations.  The  world’s  work 
is  performed  under  greater  and  greater  psychic 
pressure — pressure  of  time,  pressure  of  imposed 
eflSciency  standards,  of  competition,  of  am¬ 
bition,  of  social  expectation,  of  subsistence 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


145 


necessities  growing  out  of  the  beginnings  of 
over  population.”^ 

This  complex  situation  calls  for  a  solution 
which  is  far  beyond  the  ability  of  the  church 
with  “pep  and  piety.”  We  need  to  relate  the 
beauty  of  holiness  to  the  holiness  of  beauty, 
as  it  bears  on  the  practice  of  worship.  Where 
this  connection  is  made  there  would  be  seen 
the  Classicist’s  love  of  truth,  the  Romanticist’s 
love  of  nature’s  beauty,  and  the  Puritan’s  zeal 
for  goodness.  There  need  be  no  breach  between 
religion  and  the  permanent  categories  of  truth, 
beauty,  and  goodness.  Even  though  they  are 
like  three  divergent  rivers,  they  trace  their 
source  to  the  one  spring  in  common  with  the 
river  of  religion.®  A  careful  examination  of 
these  waters  reveals  the  fact  that  they  all 
have  the  iron  of  art  which  gives  them  tonic 
qualities.  The  great  lack  of  Protestantism  is 
“not  intellectual  nor  moral  but  artistic,  not 
ethical  but  cultural.”  In  order  that  we  might 
supply  this  shortcoming,  we  should  first  accept 
the  conclusion  that  if  art  needs  religion  to 
universalize  its  background  of  mental  and 
moral  concepts  and  to  correct  its  moral  con- 

®“Who  is  Enriched  by  the  Enrichment  of  Worship?”  by 
George  A.  Coe  in  The  Journal  of  Religion,  January,  1923, 
p.  25. 

®  Compare  “Worship”  by  Canon  Streeter  in  Concerning 
Prayer,  p.  248f. 


146 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


tent,  it  is  no  less  true  that  religion  needs  art 
to  be  impressive  and  to  gain  a  hearing  which 
is  one  of  the  self-evident  concerns  of  the 
church.  The  crying  desideratum,  then,  is 
openness  of  mind,  brotherliness  of  disposition, 
love  of  the  beautiful,  that  shall  fm*nish  a 
spacious  background  for  the  reception  and 
culture  of  a  vitally  spiritual  experience  of  the 
living  God  in  Christ,  making  for  the  deeper 
unity  of  the  church.  Thus  only  would  we  be 
able  to  formulate  and  fashion  a  worship  worthy 
of  the  God  of  our  redemption.  It  will  retain 
all  the  fundamental  elements  characteristic  of 
this  central  performance  but  with  certain 
differences  that  reckon  with  the  modem  de¬ 
mand  for  fullness  of  expression.  ‘'The  worship 
of  the  new  age  will  be  not  less  but  more  reli¬ 
gious  in  spirit,  not  less  but  more  Christian  in 
essential  character.  If  the  spur  of  the  scientist 
is  the  love  of  truth,  the  joy  of  the  Christian 
is  the  Truth  of  Love.  If  the  zeal  of  the  moralist 
strives  to  achieve  some  association  or  brother¬ 
hood  of  goodness,  the  joy  of  the  Christian  is 
the  Goodness  of  Brotherhood.  If  the  satis¬ 
faction  of  the  artist  is  the  life  of  beauty,  the 
joy  of  the  Christian  is  the  Beauty  of  Life — 
all  life,  man’s  life,  the  Life  of  God.”^° 


Vogt:  Art  and  Religion,  p.  251.  Reprinted  with  per¬ 
mission  of  Yale  University  Press,  New  Haven,  Connecticut. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


147 


This  is  certainly  an  alluring  ideal.  The 
healthy  movement  toward  Christian  unity 
calls  for  a  reconsideration  of  the  question  of 
worship.  It  is  in  this  field  that  the  adequate 
answer  will  be  found,  that  shall  produce  the 
harmonious  fellowship  of  many,  who  give 
“diligence  to  keep  the  unity  of  the  Spirit  in 
the  bond  of  peace. The  passion  for  the 
ideal  Whole  has  often  been  misdirected  because 
of  the  excessive  individualism  of  Protestant¬ 
ism.  The  Puritan’s  revolt  against  art  and 
beauty,  his  antagonism  to  symbols  and  forms, 
his  advocacy  of  the  exclusive  preaching  of 
the  Word  were  all  inevitable  in  an  age  of 
spiritual  corruption  and  emptiness.  But  with 
the  growth  of  popular  education  and  an  in¬ 
creased  appreciation  of  the  arts  and  sciences, 
the  spirit  of  vandalism  and  intolerance  is 
happily  disappearing,  and  “many  are  feeling 
after  the  proper  redressing  of  the  balance  of 
worship  long  disturbed  by  historical  causes.” 
The  higher  unity  of  the  churches  will  not  be 
secured  primarily  through  intellectual  convic¬ 
tions  and  agreements.  “Spiritual  fellowship, 
sympathy  of  heart  with  heart,  and  mutual 
understanding  must  precede  intellectual  con- 

“  Ephesians  4.  3. 

Compare  J.  V.  Bartlet:  Article  on  “Christian  Worship” 
in  EncyclojpoBdia  of  Religion  and  Ethics ,  vol.  xii,  p.  776. 


148 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


cord.”^^  The  contemplated  changes  in  wor¬ 
ship  should  be  discussed  in  an  atmosphere  of 
deepened  spiritual  life,  in  which  we  distinguish 
between  the  things  that  differ,  and  discern 
the  inherent  value  in  things  that  are  unfamiliar 
and  even  unfavorable.  Nor  is  it  easy  to  over¬ 
come  offhand  the  prejudices  of  many  genera¬ 
tions.  Those  who  try  to  introduce  innovations 
by  short  cuts  and  quick  methods  are  doomed 
to  disappointment.  However  advantageous 
these  may  be,  most  people  do  not  take  kindly 
to  what  conflicts  with  accustomed  ways. 
Established  customs,  especially  when  sanc¬ 
tioned  by  long  usage  and  sanctified  by  palpable 
benefits,  cannot  be  set  aside  in  favor  of  any¬ 
thing  better  until  it  proves  itself  worthy  and 
well  qualified.  And  this  is  by  no  means  an 
easy  enterprise.  It  is  nevertheless  worth 
undertaking,  and  that  by  those  who  are  per¬ 
suaded  in  their  own  mind  that  the  suggested 
changes  have  decided  advantages  far  greater 
than  those  already  controlling  the  situation. 
Canon  Streeter  wisely  remarked,  “The  world 
is  looking  for  guidance;  but  the  guide  must  be 
one  who  has  the  courage  to  discard  what  is 


Cyril  Hepher:  The  Fruits  of  Silence,  p.  69.  Reprinted 
with  permission  of  Macmillan  &  Co.,  Ltd.,  Publishers, 
London. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


149 


obsolete  and  the  insight  to  create  what  is 
new.”^^ 

There  are  certain  desirable  features  in  an 
attractive  and  acceptable  worship,  always  in 
good  taste  and  indispensable  for  its  beneficial 
practice.  The  first  is  reality,  which  discounte¬ 
nances  slipshod  ways  of  thought,  haphazard 
methods  of  action,  listless  attitudes,  artificial 
mannerisms,  conventional  restraints  that  vio¬ 
late  the  inner  sanctities  of  life  by  hardening 
them  into  set  forms  and  endangering  the 
resilient  freedom  of  the  Spirit.  Such  reality 
looks  askance  at  external  authorities,  as  such, 
that  set  up  barriers  in  the  path  of  liberty  by 
establishing  a  mechanical  uniformity  that  dead¬ 
ens  the  central  constraints.  The  history  of 
Nonconformity  is  a  protest  against  whatever 
handicaps  the  energy  of  faith  and  militates 
against  the  realization  of  the  life  abundant 
in  Jesus  Christ,  through  direct  contacts  with 
the  Spirit  of  holiness  and  the  culture  of  the 
experimental  knowledge  of  God  who  is  the 
only  solace  of  the  soul.  It  is  evident  that 
the  reality  of  God  could  be  verified  where 
there  is  the  open  vision,  the  immediate 
approach,  the  imminent  response,  and  the 


“Christ  the  Constructive  Revolutionary”  in  The  Spirit, 
p.  367. 


150 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


fertile  fellowship  in  the  light  of  increasing 
spiritual  splendor  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ. 
“The  religion  of  Jesus  is  the  reality  of  life. 
If  a  sense  of  unreality  haunts  men  with  regard 
to  religion,  Jesus  is  misunderstood  or  misrepre¬ 
sented.  There  is  nothing  remote,  occult,  or 
unreal  about  him.  He  is  vital.  He  strips 
religion  of  everything  artificial  and  reveals 
life.  He  is  at  once  simpler  and  deeper  than 
all  expositions  concerning  him.”^^ 

Another  feature  of  profitable  worship  is 
consideration^  which  guards  against  the  empty 
meaninglessness  of  routine.  The  psalmist  was 
confused  over  his  trials,  but  he  found  an  answer 
to  his  perplexities: 

“When  I  thought  how  I  might  know  this. 

It  was  too  painful  for  me; 

Until  I  went  into  the  sanctuary  of  God, 
And  considered  their  latter  end.”^® 

It  is  in  the  atmosphere  of  thoughtful  waiting 
upon  God  that  the  saints  have  ever  found  the 
perspective  of  confidence,  that  they  are  the 
people  of  God  and  that  he  is  a  very  present 

J.  H.  Chambers  Macaulay:  The  Reality  of  Jesus,  p.  vii. 
This  book  is  a  quickening  argument  for  intrinsic  realities 
that  center  in  Jesus,  without  which  Christian  worship  is 
vain.  George  H.  Doran  Company. 

“  Psalm  78.  16f. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


151 


help  amidst  changes  and  troubles.  The  direc¬ 
tion  thus  obtained  brought  to  them  the  resolu¬ 
tion  to  stand  fast  in  the  faith  as  against  the 
fickleness  of  the  faithless,  the  power  to  be 
watchful  as  against  the  heedlessness  of  the 
indifferent,  the  ability  to  quit  themselves  like 
mature  adults  as  against  the  puerile  childish¬ 
ness  of  those  who  go  by  their  feelings  and  not 
by  their  reasonings,  the  strength  to  endure 
even  unto  the  end  as  against  the  moral  sloppi¬ 
ness  of  those  who  strain  out  the  gnat  and 
swallow  the  camel.  They  therefore  enjoyed 
present  happiness  and  also  made  it  possible 
for  others  because  they  had  a  heart  at  leisure 
and  a  spirit  in  the  poise  of  contentment. 

The  reflection  induced  under  these  circum¬ 
stances  also  gave  them  such  a  cansiderateness 
for  others  that  they  showed  patience  under 
provocation,  tranquility  in  tribulation,  heroism 
in  heaviness  of  soul.  They  both  had  com¬ 
passion  on  them  that  were  in  bonds  and  took 
joyfully  the  confiscation  of  their  belongings, 
knowing  that  they  had  for  themselves  higher 
and  lasting  possessions.^^  Their  readiness  to 
befriend  the  unfortunate  and  to  show  discern¬ 
ing  leniency  rather  than  to  pass  hasty  judgment 
manifestly  argued  a  conception  of  God  and  of 
human  destiny  that  belittled  neither  but  mag- 


Hebrews  10.  34. 


152 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


nified  both,  advertising  also  the  buoyancy  of 
their  spiritual  emancipation  and  endurance  in 
Christ. 

All  this,  furthermore,  gave  evidence  of  the 
quality  of  their  reserve  resources  which  were 
being  constantly  replenished  from  the  sources 
of  spiritual  plenitude  during  the  hours  of 
worship.  Such  assurance  had  they  God  ward 
that  the  uncertainties  of  fortune  and  the 
emergencies  of  duty  always  found  them  pre¬ 
pared.  With  this  surplus  at  their  disposal 
they  never  felt  impoverished.  They  could 
always  fall  back  upon  a  reserve  which  was  an 
increasing  and  not  a  diminishing  quantity. 
They  were  therefore  competent  to  give  proof 
of  their  allegiance,  however  onerous  were  the 
burdens  to  be  borne,  however  exacting  were 
the  demands  to  be  met,  however  numerous 
were  the  tasks  to  be  performed.  We  suffer 
so  easily  from  spiritual  exhaustion  because  we 
know  little  of  the  secret  of  those  who  wait 
upon  the  Lord  and  renew  their  strength,  who 
mount  up  with  wings  as  eagles,  above  the 
depressions  of  untoward  circumstances,  who 
run  and  are  not  weary,  walk  and  not  faint. 

These  experienced  believers  came  to  the 
season  of  worship  not  when  they  had  reached 
the  end  of  their  tether,  as  a  last  but  not  spe- 


Isaiah  40.  31. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


153 


cially  welcome  alternative.  It  was  with  them 
a  steady  practice  to  which  they  had  become 
habituated  and  which  was  as  indispensable  as 
the  very  act  of  breathing.  The  author  of  the 
Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  declared  the  ultimate 
meaning  of  religion,  in  the  phrase,  ‘To  draw 
near  to  God,”  which  he  repeated  in  several 
connections.  He  thought  of  religion  as  pre¬ 
eminently  an  act  of  worship,  whereby  the 
believer  has  access  to  God  and  to  the  higher 
world  of  sublime,  heavenly  realities.  “To  come 
into  God’s  presence  is  to  pass  through  the 
veil — to  rise  out  of  the  sphere  of  change  and 
illusion  and  find  our  true  home  among  the 
things  that  cannot  be  shaken.  From  this  it 
follows  that  worship  does  not  consist  in  cer¬ 
tain  acts  of  homage,  performed  at  stated 
intervals,  but  in  the  abiding  condition  of  those 
whom  God  has  accepted  as  his  people.”^^  The 
Christian  life  is  thereby  seen  to  be,  not  only 
one  of  uninterrupted  fellowship  with  God  in 
Christ  but  also  one  of  attainment  through  the 
perfecting  of  character  and  of  behavior  in  the 
light  of  the  unseen  power  of  the  heavenly  world. 
Worship  under  these  circumstances  is  an 
offering  of  grateful  thanksgiving  to  God,  who 
gives  a  continuous  sense  of  his  nearness  and 

E.  F.  Scott:  The  Epistle  to  the  Hebretvs.  Its  Doctrine 
and  Significance,  p.  81. 


154 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


imparts  an  appreciative  understanding  of  the 
manifold  wonder  of  the  divine  in  the  human 
and  of  the  human  in  the  divine. 

Such  a  conception  of  worship  presupposes 
that  it  “stands  neither  in  forms  nor  in  the 
formal  disuse  of  forms.”  It  is,  rather,  con¬ 
tingent  on  the  spirit  of  devotion  which  “sig¬ 
nifies  a  life  given  or  devoted  to  God.”  God 
is  recognized  as  the  Transcendent  One  who 
is  above  us  and  who  calls  forth  our  reverence, 
adoration,  praise,  confession,  and  prayer.  He 
is  also  the  Immanent  One,  who  is  beside  us, 
the  Father  of  grace  and  sympathy,  the  source 
in  Christ  Jesus  of  wisdom  and  righteousness 
and  sanctification  and  redemption.^^  Such 
communion  and  intercommunion,  fructified  by 
a  growing  certainty  and  progressing  experience 
of  “the  powers  of  the  world  to  come,”  bring 
encouragement  in  faith,  hope,  and  love,  for 
the  service  of  mature  freedom,  in  fulfilling  the 
divine  purpose,  to  bring  all  mankind  to  repent¬ 
ance  and  reconciliation.^^  Whether  liturgical  or 
free  prayer  helps  or  hinders  this  spontaneous 
function  of  the  soul  depends  on  circumstances. 
Some  forms  are  like  the  scaffolding  for  the 
spiritual  structure,  others  are  definite  aids  to 
devotion.  Extempore  prayer  that  flows  out 

2°  1  Corinthians  1.  30. 

2  Peter  3.  9. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


155 


of  a  full  heart  gives  utterance  to  vital  needs. 
Silent  prayer  that  voices  the  desires  of  a  spirit 
immersed  in  God  is  like  the  song  without 
words.  Just  as  the  orchestra  has  many  instru¬ 
ments  which  blend  to  make  harmonious  music, 
so  a  complete  worship  that  would  guard  against 
the  bareness  of  uniformity  and  obtain  the 
opulence  of  unity  in  variety  is  inclusive  of 
many  forms  which  complement  each  other, 
to  utter  the  thoughts  and  to  meet  the  needs 
of  divers  worshipers,  ad  magnam  gloriam  DeiJ^- 

Before  deciding  on  this  matter  of  forms  it 
is  well  to  recall  once  more  that  “worship  is 
not  thought,  but  the  orientation  of  the  whole 
self  toward  God.”^^  It  is  “the  adjustment 
of  the  private  point  of  view  to  the  world  em¬ 
bracing  purpose.”-^  This  includes  emotion, 
intellect,  and  will,  leading  to  action.  Worship 
is  a  means  to  the  great  end,  which  is  the 
acceptable  service  of  God  in  consummate 
living  and  consistent  working.  If  the  liturgical 
service  tends  to  monotony,  the  nonliturgical 
service  makes  for  vagrancy.  Is  it  not,  however, 

“  Compare  “The  Unity  of  the  Church,”  by  Dr.  E.  C. 
Palmer,  Anglican  Bishop  of  Bombay,  in  The  Constructive 
Quarterly,  December,  1919,  p.  610. 

Compare  Percy  Dearmer:  The  Art  of  Public  Worship^ 

p.  81. 

^  Henry  T.  Hodgkin:  The  Christian  Revolution,  p.  197. 
George  H.  Doran  Company. 


156 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


true  that  where  no  regular  liturgy  is  used  the 
minister  who  monopolizes  the  service  invariably 
follows  certain  “conventional  lines,”  and  has 
a  liturgy  without  a  liturgy?  Unless  he  is  a 
man  of  exceptional  spiritual  gifts  his  prayers 
show  little  variety  and  less  versatility,  as 
Sunday  by  Sunday  he  acts  as  the  mouthpiece 
of  his  congregation,  presumably  uttering  their 
manifold  wants  and  desires  before  God,  in  which 
the  world  vision  is  by  no  means  absent.  “If 
all  ministers  could  pray  always,”  said  Sir  W. 
Robertson  Nicoll,  “as  some  can  pray  at  times, 
there  would  be  no  question  of  liturgies.”  The 
repetition  of  set  prayers  may  doubtless  become 
mechanical  and  dull  the  edge  of  worship.  But 
W’ho  can  deny  that  extempore  prayers,  which 
are  often  impromptu  prayers,  frequently  dis¬ 
sipate  concentration  of  thought,  and  are  partly 
responsible  for  the  “lethargy"  of  piety”  which 
afflicts  us?  If  ill-conceived  forms  of  worship 
that  disregard  the  significance  of  the  hour 
cramp  and  strangle  the  spontaneity  of  the 
soul,  might  not  the  same  be  said  of  prayers 
that  generally  reflect  only  the  individualistic 
moods  of  the  minister?  “The  plea  that  we 
should  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  the  demand  for  a 
more  elaborate  worship  because  it  precludes 
a  prophetic  pulpit  is  not  necessarily  valid;  and 
if  it  were,  the  unchurched  multitudes  might 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


157 


nevertheless  prefer  that  sort  of  worship.”^® 
It  cannot  be  said  that  preachers  generally 
prepare  their  prayers  with  anything  like  the 
thought  they  put  into  their  sermons.  We  are 
beginning  to  see  that  ‘‘sermonolatry”  may 
prove  to  be  a  serious  interference  with  a  many- 
sided  worship,  which  should  reckon  with  the 
other  arts  beside  that  of  rhetoric,  to  develop 
the  exercises  of  the  sanctuary.  In  many  of 
our  churches  we  have  got  into  the  unspeakable 
way  of  hurrying  through  the  so-called  “pre¬ 
liminaries,”  as  though  the  sermon  were  the 
only  thing  that  counts.  Not  a  few  people  are 
regularly  late  in  coming  to  church.  They 
arrive  in  time  for  the  sermon  without  any  sense 
of  appreciation  of  the  need  for  the  opening 
exercises,  which  in  their  mind  apparently  have 
no  place  for  the  culture  of  their  devotional 
life.^®  The  tendency  to  entertain  rather  than 
to  edify,  the  appeal  to  variety  instead  of  unity, 
the  demand  for  curiosity  more  than  for  con¬ 
sideration,  the  presence  of  stir  and  movement 
more  than  the  quiet  of  reverent  waiting  upon 
God,  the  atmosphere  of  bustle  and  not  of 
buoyancy  —  these  are  among  the  causes  of 
what  has  been  pungently  described  as  “the 


*5  S.  Parkes  Cadman:  Ambassadors  of  God,  p.  321. 
Compare  M.  J.  McLeod:  Letters  to  Edward,  p.  20. 


158 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


collapse  of  worship  in  Protestant  com- 
munions.”“^ 

Our  need,  then,  is  to  correlate  the  different 
parts  of  worship,  so  that  there  shall  be  neither 
caprice  nor  narrowness.  There  should  be  a 
balanced  proportion  of  all  the  varied  elements 
that  constitute  a  wholesome  offering  of  praise 
and  prayer  to  the  living  God,  a  healthy  prac¬ 
tice  of  recollection  and  realization  of  the 
presence  of  God,  and  a  quiet  meditation  upon 
the  unseen  realities  of  the  spiritual  world. 
The  objective,  it  is  needless  to  say,  is  to  prepare 
the  worshipers  for  the  trying  duties  and  press¬ 
ing  responsibilities  in  the  world  of  daily  grind 
and  tedious  routine.  There  is,  indeed,  nothing 
else  that  could  be  substituted  for  regular 
worship  as  a  help  against  the  overwhelming 
onslaughts  from  materialistic  passions  and 
appetites.  We  should  therefore  welcome  the 
timely  call  to  enlarge  and  enrich  the  scope  and 
influence  of  worship.  Such  worship,  moreover, 
is  not  individualistic  but  corporate,  so  that  it 
is  perilous,  to  say  the  least,  to  leave  its  conduct 
wholly  to  the  taste  and  temperament  of  the 
minister.  It  is  not  a  railing  accusation  to  say 
that  the  manners  and  mannerisms  of  some 
ministers,  as  leaders  of  worship,  are  lacking  in 
reverence  and  dignity,  and  verge  on  the  bizzare. 


^  Compare  Fitch:  Preaching  and  Paganism,  p.  194. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


159 


due  more  to  thoughtlessness  than  to  intention. 
The  language  should  be  of  the  choicest,  the 
demeanor  the  most  refined,  the  tone  most 
elevating,  exhibiting  a  man  who  is  conscious 
of  the  profound  significance  of  the  hour,  dur¬ 
ing  which  he  is  to  mediate  between  God  and 
man,  as  a  priest  who  approaches  God  on  behalf 
of  and  with  his  people,  and  as  a  prophet  who 
comes  from  God  to  his  people  with  a  message 
suited  to  their  guidance  and  growth  in  the 
Christian  virtues. 

Worship  is  the  greatest  and  the  finest  of  all 
arts.  It,  moreover,  includes  all  the  other  arts 
as  contributory  to  its  finer  development.  The 
aesthetic  and  the  architectural  in  the  physical 
sanctuary;  the  musical  and  the  literary  as 
they  accord  with  the  religious  in  the  spiritual 
sanctuary;  the  cultural  and  the  traditional  in 
the  creeds  and  symbols  which  comport  with 
the  continuity  and  dignity  of  religious  aspira¬ 
tion  and  deed;  the  sacramental  and  the  spiritual 
which  reckon  with  the  sanctity  of  the  common¬ 
place  and  recognize  the  eternal  in  the  temporal ; 
the  liturgical  and  the  informal,  both  of  which 
protect  the  inwardness  of  religion  and  meet 
the  desires  for  the  familiar  in  accustomed 
forms  and  for  the  spontaneous  outpourings  of 
the  soul  in  extemporaneous  utterance — all  of 
these  considerations  merit  our  most  serious 


160 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


attention.  Thus  shall  we  secure  a  catholic 
worship,  having  unity  in  diversity,  harmony 
with  good  form,  heartiness  with  fine  taste,  to 
further  the  culture  of  the  intellectual,  the 
beautiful,  the  spiritual,  the  useful,  as  a  well- 
ordered  whole,  for  the  praise  of  the  divine 
Majesty,  enthroned  in  holiness  and  truth. 

When  we  are  stressing  the  wholeness  of  life 
in  the  name  of  the  Incarnate  Christ,  it  is  evi¬ 
dent  we  should  remove  all  barriers  that  exist 
between  religion  and  the  manifold  interests  of 
morals,  of  thought,  of  science,  of  literatme,  of 
the  fine  arts.  All  these  puiport  to  recreate 
life  and  to  redirect  its  impulses  along  the 
avenues  that  are  free  from  the  obstacles  of 
prejudice  and  one-sidedness.  But  they  have 
not  been  able  to  carry  far  because  of  manifest 
limitations.  It  is  just  here  that  religion  should 
come  to  the  rescue  and  furnish  the  stimulus 
that  would  help  the  pilgrim  to  go  forward 
serenely  and  assuringly  toward  the  City  of 
God.^^  We  contend  that  the  Christian  religion 
that  touches  the  divers  interests  and  concerns 
of  life,  past,  present  and  future,  is  most  com¬ 
petent  to  liberate  the  soul  from  the  meshes  of 
bondage  to  obsessions,  be  they  intellectual, 
artistic,  social,  or  religious.  The  unique  genius 
of  Christianity  is  its  universalism,  and  any  type 


^  Compare  Vogt:  Art  and  Religion^  29ff.,  66. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


161 


of  sectarianism  which  presumes  to  be  final  is 
a  sorry  caricature  of  the  intrinsic  reality.  This 
applies  with  equal  force  to  doctrines,  modes  of 
worship,  styles  of  architecture,  ecclesiastical 
mandates  and  polities,  such  as  tend  to  stereo¬ 
type  and  strangle  the  irrepressible  life  of 
religion.  One  of  the  unhappy  results  of  reli¬ 
gious  excitement  is  that  emotionalism  has 
frequently  been  made  the  infallible  test  of 
religious  reality.  Those  who  declare  that  they 
have  had  a  wonderfully  spiritual  time  often 
mistake  physical  thrills  and  ecstasies  for 
spiritual  enlightenment  and  enduement.^^ 
There  are  many  strings  to  the  violin,  and, 
while  it  is  possible  for  a  Paganini  to  produce 
celestial  music  out  of  a  solitary  string,  such  a 
brilliant  exception  proves  the  rule  that  for  the 
regular  harmonies,  all  the  strings  are  necessary. 
It  is  not  an  exclusive  worship  but  an  inclusive 
worship  that  our  present  necessities  desiderate. 
It  should  gather  up  the  “differing  strains  of 
religious  experience”  into  a  sublime  unity,  that 
shall  sound  together  the  matchless  psean  of 
“Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  and  on  earth 
peace,  good  will  toward  men.” 

Mediaevalism  has  had  its  day,  and,  although 
certain  of  its  aspects  are  still  welcome,  the 
more  opulent  worship  that  our  age  needs  cannot 


^  Compare  Alexander  Mackie:  The  Gift  of  Tongues,  p.  26ff. 


162 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


be  obtained  by  any  revival  of  mediaeval  forms 
and  usages.  It  was  said  of  the  High  Church 
party  in  Anglicanism  that  “They  are  trying  to 
recover  the  insights  and  practices  of  mediaeval 
piety;  they  are  archaistic  in  devotion.”^®  May 
not  the  same  be  said  of  Puritanism  which  has 
had  its  vogue  and  its  influence.^  We  cannot 
revert  to  the  Puritan  simplicities  which  verge 
on  bareness.  However  much  they  satisfied 
the  spiritual  cravings  of  the  past,  they  are 
inadequate  for  the  present  day,  which  calls 
for  intellectual  poise,  for  aesthetic  beauty,  for 
emotional  control,  for  ethical  depth,  for  social 
responsibility,  for  spiritual  fullness,  in  a  wor¬ 
ship  that  is  free  and  not  fettered,  resilient  and 
not  rigid,  vitalizing  and  not  sterilizing.  We 
need  such  a  development  that  will  retain  the 
connection  with  historic  Christianity  and  con¬ 
serve  all  that  is  best  in  the  traditional  worship 
of  the  church.  But  what  has  come  down  to 
us  must  first  be  remagnetized  for  the  sake  of 
*  such  advances  as  shall  make  more  effective 
our  common  worship  by  the  increase  of  spir¬ 
itual  fervor. 

We  need  to  enlarge  our  conception  of 
the  sacramental  idea.  Romanism  with  its 
acceptance  of  the  seven  sacraments  of  baptism, 

^  George  Santayana:  Soliloquies  in  England  and  Later 
Soliloquies,  p.  88. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


163 


confirmation,  the  eucharist,  holy  orders,  pen¬ 
ance,  marriage,  extreme  unction,  touches  life 
at  many  more  critical  points  than  Protestant¬ 
ism,  which  is  content  with  the  two  sacraments 
of  baptism  and  the  eucharist.  To  be  sure, 
we  magnify  the  sacrament  of  the  preached 
Word.  The  gospel  of  the  Incarnation,  however, 
proclaims  the  sanctity  of  all  life,  and,  while 
certain  specific  acts  are  regarded  as  definite 
means  of  grace,  a  wider  inclusion  of  what  has 
hitherto  been  regarded  as  merely  secular  would 
tend  to  sanctify  larger  areas  of  life  and  ulti¬ 
mately  bring  everything  under  the  redeeming 
and  purifying  influence  of  the  Divine  Spirit. 
The  fact  that  baptism  and  the  eucharist  have 
been  associated  with  corrupt  practices  does 
not  militate  against  their  observance  but, 
rather,  calls  for  a  reexamination  of  their  funda¬ 
mental  significance  in  the  light  of  their  original 
ordination  and  of  their  rightful  observance 
during  the  centuries.^^  It  goes  without  saying 
that  the  sense  of  God  is  mediated  through  the 
eucharist  in  a  way  that  no  other  practice  of 
worship  affords.  Anything  that  will  restore 
it  to  its  place  of  strategic  importance  for  the 
culture  of  the  spiritual  life  should  certainly  be 

^  Compare  my  Freedom  and  Advance,  Chapter  VII,  on 
“Christian  Worship,”  for  a  discussion  of  these  two  sacra¬ 
ments,  p.  150ff. 


164 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


favorably  considered.  “The  way  of  escape 
from  the  dryness,  deadness,  conventionality, 
and  spiritual  poverty  that  spreads  its  blight 
over  so  much  of  modern  worship,  lies,  I  beheve, 
in  according  a  yet  greater  preeminence  to  the 
eucharist,  which  the  history  of  Christianity 
and  the  witness  of  the  New  Testament  incon¬ 
testably  make  the  very  center  of  Christian 
worship.”^^  In  an  age  of  jazz  and  “sloppy 
irreverence,”  how  urgent  that  the  hymns  used 
in  worship  at  the  Sunday  and  midweek  services 
and  at  the  sessions  of  the  Sunday  school  should 
express  genuine  Christian  sentiments  in  appro¬ 
priate  words  and  tunes.  When  the  Bible  is 
read  so  little  by  the  people  who  attend  our 
services,  how  imperative  that  a  discriminating 
choice  should  be  made  from  the  entire  round 
of  both  Old  and  New  Testaments,  and  that 
the  reading  shall  be  given  with  clear  enunciation 
and  fitting  emphasis,  such  as  the  sacred  page 
justly  merits. Since  the  spirit  of  devotion 
tends  to  become  minimized,  and  the  exercise 
of  concentration  is  so  much  of  a  strain,  how 
desirable  that,  instead  of  the  invocation  and 
the  one  long  pastoral  prayer,  there  should  be 

*2  Hepher:  The  Fruits  of  Silence,  p.  127. 

Compare  R.  W.  Rogers:  A  Book  of  Old  Testament  Lessons. 
This  volume  by  a  devout  scholar  should  be  supplemented 
by  a  book  of  New  Testament  lessons.  The  Abingdon  Press. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


165 


frequent  intervals  of  prayer,  which  focus  the 
attention  respectively  on  adoration,  thanks¬ 
giving,  confession,  supplication,  intercession, 
with  at  least  one  period  for  silent  prayer.^ 

We  have  advanced  beyond  the  ideal  of  a 
plain  worship,  which  doubtless  satisfied  our 
fathers.  May  their  memory  be  forever  blessed ! 
We  insist  no  less  earnestly  than  they  did  that 
the  fires  and  fervors  of  the  religious  life  should 
never  cease  in  our  midst,  and  that  the  altar  of 
the  burning  heart  should  ever  be  conspicuous. 
But  the  means  for  conserving  and  developing 
these  must  be  different.  Suggested  changes  are 
bound  to  meet  with  criticism,  positive  and 
negative.  Those  who  realize  the  advisability 
of  new  ways  should  not  be  alarmed  by  objec¬ 
tions  nor  regard  these  as  merely  the  pleas  of 
obscurantism.  An  interchange  of  thought  and 
discussion  in  an  atmosphere  of  charity,  which 
is  the  mother  of  all  virtues,  would  lead  us  out 
of  the  dilemmas  of  contradiction  and  incon¬ 
sistency  into  more  favorable  situations.  The 
outlook  is  most  encouraging,  as  the  pioneer 
experimenters  themselves  report,  and  as  our 
own  observations  indicate.  We  are  on  the  eve 
of  the  renaissance  of  a  more  spiritual  worship. 
Let  us  welcome  the  new  day  with  the  assurance 

Compare  the  essay  on  “Worship”  by  Canon  Streeter  in 
Concerning  Prayer,  p.  286ff. 


166 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


of  faith,  the  endurance  of  hope,  and  the  jubi¬ 
lance  of  love,  that  our  services  and  our  service 
in  the  Holy  Spirit  may  be  more  acceptable  to 
God  through  Jesus  Christ. 

“Immortal  honor,  endless  fame, 

Attend  the  Almighty  Father’s  name: 

The  Saviour  Son  be  glorified. 

Who  for  lost  man’s  redemption  died: 

And  equal  adoration  be. 

Eternal  Paraclete,  to  thee!” 

35  1  Peter  2.  5. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


167 


SUGGESTED  READING 

A.  General 

Von  Ogden  Vogt:  Art  and  Religion. 

Percy  Dearmer:  The  Art  of  Public  Worship. 

B.  H.  Streeter,  Editor:  Concerning  Prayer. 

James  Hastings,  Editor :  Encyclopaedia  of  Religion 

and  Ethics.  Articles  on  “Worship,”  Volume  XII, 
p.  752ff. 

C.  A.  Anderson  Scott:  The  Fellowship  of  the 
Spirit. 

Arthur  S.  Hoyt:  Public  Worship  for  N on-Liturgical 
Churches. 

A.  V.  G.  Allen:  Christian  Institutions. 

K.  R.  Stolz:  The  Psychology  of  Prayer. 

F.  B.  Macnutt,  Editor:  The  Church  in  the 
Furnace. 

Louis  F.  Benson:  The  English  Hymn. 

A.  E.  Bailey:  The  Use  of  Art  in  Religious  Educa¬ 
tion. 

B.  H.  Streeter,  Editor:  The  Spirit. 

The  Worship  of  the  Church.  Report  of  the  Arch¬ 
bishops’  Committee  of  Inquiry. 

Leighton  Parks:  The  Crisis  of  the  Churches. 

P.  T.  Forsyth:  The  Church  and  the  Sacraments. 
Theron  Brown  and  Hezekiah  Butterworth:  The 
Story  of  the  Hymns  and  Tunes. 

B.  Manuals 

W.  E.  Orchard:  The  Order  of  Divine  Service  for 
Public  Worship. 


168 


THE  DYNAMIC  MINISTRY 


John  Hunter:  Devotional  Services  for  Public  Wor¬ 
ship. 

Book  of  Congregational  Worship. 

The  Book  of  Common  Worship. 

The  Book  of  Common  Prayer. 

Manresa.  The  Spiritual  Exercises  of  St.  Ignatius. 

All  of  the  Church  Hymnals. 

Oscar  L.  Joseph :  Hearth  and  Altar. 

Sir  Henry  S.  Lunn:  The  Love  of  Jesus y  and  Re¬ 
treats  for  the  Soul. 

Wilbur  P.  Thirkield:  Service  and  Prayers  for  Church 
and  Home. 

Walter  Rauschenbusch :  For  God  and  the  People, 
Prayers  of  the  Social  Awakening. 

C.  Devotional  Books 

W.  Hermann:  The  Communion  of  the  Christian 
with  God. 

J.  Rendel  Harris:  The  Guiding  Hand  of  God. 

R.  F.  Horton:  The  Open  Secret. 

Rufus  M.  Jones:  Spiritual  Energies  in  Daily  Life, 

Cyril  Hepher,  Editor:  The  Fellowship  of  Silence. 

Basil  Mathews  and  Harry  Bisseker:  Fellowship  in 
Thought  and  Prayer. 

H.  E.  Fosdick:  The  Meaning  of  Prayer. 

R.  E.  Welsh:  Classics  of  the  SouVs  Quest. 

W.  Robertson  Nicoll:  The  Return  to  the  Cross. 

G.  G.  Atkins:  Pilgrims  of  the  Lonely  Way. 

A.  C.  Hogg:  Ckrisfs  Message  of  the  Kingdom, 

Alexander  Maclaren:  Pulpit  Prayers. 

Caroline  M.  Hill,  Editor:  The  World's  Great 
Religious  Poetry. 


THE  OPULENT  WORSHIP 


169 


John  Wright  Buckham:  Mysticism  and  Modern 
Life, 

E.  Hershey  Sneath,  Editor:  At  One  with  the 
Invisible. 

Amelia  M.  Gummere,  Editor:  The  Journal  of 
John  Woolman. 

Alexander  Smellie:  The  Well  by  the  Way. 

John  Oxenham:  Bees  in  Amber. 

Francis  G.  Peabody:  Mornings  in  the  College 
Chapel,  first  and  second  series. 

Richard  Roberts:  Thai  One  Face. 

Donald  Hankey:  The  Lord  of  all  Good  Life, 
William  F.  McDowell:  This  Mind. 


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